
Class. 
Book. 



COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT 



HISTO R Y 



OF 



TUCKER COUNTY, 

WFST VIRGINIA, 

FROM THE EIRLIEST EXPLORATIONS AND SETTLE 
MENTS TO THE PRESENT TIME; 



IJIOGliAPHICAL SKETCHESl OF MORE THAN T\V(J HUNDitKD AND 

FIFTY OF THE LEADING MEN,1 AND A FULL APPENDIX OF 

OFFICIAL AND ELECTIONAL HISTORY; ALSO, AN 

ACCOUNT OF THE RIVERS, FORESTS AND 

CAVES OF THE COUNTY. 



/ 

7i Y H U MAX A^^ K L L 



I L L U S T n A T E J) WIT J I 

I'WKNTY-KIGHT I'HOTOTYPKS OF M>TKl) I'KUSONS. 




L*'^H'ft4w'>^^^V 



K 1 N GWOO D, W. VA.: 

PRESTON PUBLISHING COMPANY. 
1884. 



COl'YKIGHT KY 

7/ r MA X W K L L. 

1884. 



Press of 
Journal Printing House 

KiNGVSOOD, W. Va. 



\ 






AS A 



SLIGHT, BUT SINCEKB KXFRESSION OF ORATITCDK, 



AS A TOKEN OF RESPECT FOR INTEGRITY AND FIRMNKS8 



IN THE CAUSE OF HISTORICAL RESEARCH, 



AS A MARK OF ESTEEM FOR NOBILITY OF I'URPOSK 



IN ALL THE LESSER AND LESS-TRODDEN PATHS OF LIFE, 



THE AUTHOR 



DEDICATES THIS J500K TO HIS FRIENI). 



WILBUll C. 13E0CKUNIEE. 



INTRODUCTION 



Had some things been different from what they were, I 
believe that I could have made the History of Tucker 
County better than it is. The hibor required to collect and 
arrange the material was greater than would be supposed 
by one who has never undertaken a task of similar nature. 
No previous history, covering the period and territory, has 
ever been compiled, and I had to enter upon original and 
unexplored fields wherever I went. There Avas no scarcity 
of subject-matter; but, at times, it was not easy for me to 
decide what to use and what to reject. I am not certain 
that I have not erred seriously in one thing — that I trusted 
more to the whims of others than to my own judgment. 
The plan of the work would have been quite different had 
I followed my own inclination to make the whole thing one 
connected storj^ instead of biographical fragments, as it is. 
3?et, as it is, it will please more people than it would if cast 
in the mold for which it was first intended. I Avas not wri- 
ting it for myself, but for others ; and, as my tastes and fan- 
cies differ from those of others, I thought it best to suit the 
book to those for whom it was intended. 

But, as I said, if some things had been otherwise, this 
book might have been better. The circumstances under 
which the work was done were not at all times pleasant or 
favorable. I commenced it in 1881, and devoted to it only 
what time Avas mine after devoting tAveh'e hours a day to 
school Avork. At first it Avas my intention to publish it in 
the Tucker County Pioneer, as a serial story ; l^ut this Avas 
abandoned when it was seen how unwise it Avas. The his- 



6 INTRODUCTION. 

tory as it was then was less tliau half as large as now, al- 
though it devoted more spaeo to the guerrilla warfare that 
was carried on along our county's borders during the Civil 
"War. When the idea of publishing it in the newspaper was 
abandoned, it was next proposed to bring it out in book 
form, and the first half-dozen pages were actually set in 
type. But, I was not pleased with it, and concluded to re- 
arrange the whole work, and the printing was accordingly 
fiuspended until the writing should be completed. 

Meanwhile, I found it necessary to give some attention to 
other matters ; for, it has never been my fortune to be so 
situated that I could devote my whole time to literary 
work. Soon, too, I grew doubtful if it was worth while to 
do an^'thing further with the matter. So, it was allowed to 
lie idle, while I found more agreeable employment in other 
fields of histor}'. Thus, nothing was done till the winter of 
1883-4. I was then in California, and had done as much on 
a new history ("Conquest of the Ohio Valley") as I could 
do without a personal visit to the Library at AVashington 
City, and, as I was not yet ready to return to the East, I 
began to consider whether it would not be a good opportu- 
nity to revise the musty manuscripts of the Tucker History. 
I was the more inclined to do this because I did not like 
the idea of having commenced a thing without finishing it. 
So, I sent to West Virginia for the manuscript and revised 
it by the time I was ready to start home, in April, 1884. 
Upon my arrival at home, I added the part embraced in "Brief 
Biographies," and sent the book to the press late in August. 

If I had (piieted myself to this task, and had nothing else 
to lead my mind off or to disturb me, I coiild have done 
better. I could have better interwoven the stories, one 
with another, and made of them one continued purpose. 



INTRODUCTION. 7 

and about tliem there would have been a completeness 
which I am conscious that they do not now possess. But it 
is not necessary to speculate upon such things as might have 
been. The book is as it is, and those who feel troubled at 
the discovery of logical errors may, if they will, let charity 
cover what is best concealed. It is not my intention to un- 
dertake another task of the kind, so I cannot truthfully 
promise to profit by irregularities that may be pointed out. 
But, from this, it should not be inferred that I look upon 
my labor as that much thankless drudgery. Far from it. 
The people of Tucker County have lent their aid and en- 
couragement to me, and have done what they could 
to assist me, and, on their account, if for nothing else, 
the work, in spite of its many discouragements and dif- 
ficulties, has been to me a pleasing one. No person feels a 
deeper and kindlier interest in the majestic mountains, the 
quiet valleys, the green meadows, the blooming orchards, 
the sweeping streams and the crystal springs of our little 
county, than I do. The interests of the people are mine, 
and their hopes and aspirations are in unison with my sym- 
pathy. The whole county, from the wind-swept crags of 
the Alleghanies to the sugar-bloom of the Seven Islands, is 
throbbing with the pulse of universal life. The past with 
its romance is lost in the present, and the present is newer 
and beautifuller than the past ever was. Who would not 
feel a pride in such a county ? If I have done anything for 
it in the present undertaking, I am glad of it ; if I have done 
nothing, I am sorry, for I have not done my duty. 

Some of the history has been wholly neglected or only 
touched, because I could not utilize it all. What I have 
left has been principally romances that cling around old 
memories. I would like to fling history aside and cast my 



8 INTRODUCTION. 

lot with them for a season. No mountain of Scotland has 
echoed to the themes of more beautiful legends that our 
mountains have. The temptation to me was great as I was 
writing the history, fori wanted to turn myself loose among 
such landscapes and people and stories as my fancy could 
create or my eyes could see already created. But I held 
steadily before my mind the fact that I was writing history, 
and I did all I could to weed from it what was not sober and 
true. I have given nothing that I do not believe to be the 
truth. I am able to rid myself of all partiality when it is 
necessary to do so, and in this case I have done it. I feel 
that I have done injustice to none. If I have, it was unin- 
tentional on my part. It has been necessary to write of 
some Avho are anything but my personal friends ; but I have 
done it without one shadow of desire to do them a wrong 
or to let them suffer by neglect. All I could ask of any man 
is to be treated as fairly as I have treated my characters in 
this History of Tucker Count}-. I hold that no man should 
be misrepresented ; but, if misrepresentations bo tolerated, 
it is better that they affect the dead than the living. I would 
rather harm the memory of a dead Washington, although 
he was my friend, than to take a mean advantage of a living 
enemj' — to injure him in a manner wherein he could not de- 
fend himself. Whether right or wrong, thus I believe. 

To those who will read this book closely enough to notice 
errata, where they exist, I would say, bear in mind that the 
book was Avritten in fragmentary parts, and did not receive 
the supervision that all histories should have. However, I 
feel confident that the serious errors are few, and Avhat they 
are, they are there Avithout the knowledge of the author at 
this hour. 

HU MAXWETJi. 

Kingwuod, Ocioher 28, 1884. 



CONTENTS 

CHAPTER I. 

JAMES PARSOXS. 



Parte. 



The County of Tucker defined. First visited by James Par- 
sons. He discovers the Horse Slioe. Passes up Horse Shoe 
Run. The Pringles. Simon Kenton. The Indians. Mound- 
builders. Mound in the Horse Shoe. Graves, bones and ar- 
row points. Captain Parsons and his brother locate lands 
on the River. Chased by Indians 17 

CHAPTER II. 

JOHN MIN15AR. 

John Minear. Early life. Leads a colony to the Horse Shoe. 
Builds a fort. Trouble with the Indians. A settler chased 
from the Sugar Lands. Settlement broken up. St. George 
founded in 1776. Fort Built. Mill. Prosperity. Reverses. 
New trouble with the Indians. The small-pox rages in Tuck- 
er. An Indian raid. Sims killed. St. George besieged. Am- 
buscade, Jonathan Minear killed. Washburn taken priso- 
ner. Pursuit of the Indians. Skirmish. Indians defeated. 
Washburn rescued. A rash Indian. Boy taken prisoner 
near St. George. Killing of John Minear, Cooper and Came- 
ron. Escape of the Millers and Goffe. The Indians pass into 
Randolph. Routed by Jesse Hughes. Burial of Minear, 
Cooper and Cameron 34 

CHAPTER III. 

MISCELLANIES. 

The manners and customs of the pioneers. Moving. Pack- 
horses. Plunder. Household articles. Bread and meat. 
Building houses. The style of houses. Clothing. Mill at 
St. George, 1776. Intoxicating liquors. Guns. Tomahawks. 
Religious worship. The customs of 'the times. Schools. 
Teachers. Modes of hnparting instruction. Singing schools. 
Romance of Manassa Minear and Lyda Holbert 69 



10 TABLE OF CONTENTS. 

CHAT'TKR IV. 

MISCKLLANIKS. 

Silent History. James Goff. Hi.'? peculiarities. The land agent. 
The supper. The Parsons family." The Bonnifields. Settle- 
ment of Clm'er District. First school-house. The Dumire 
family. The Losh family, William Losh and two friends go 
to Ohio. John Losh, the hunter. Canada : the bed of a lake. 
Lost in the woods. Captures cub-bears, ('rosses the river 
on a raft. Old settlers. Geneology. Nimrod Haddix breaks 
his neck. A mbi'ose Lipscomb. Adam Harper 87 

CHAPTER v. 

FORMATION OF 'ITCKKR OOrNTY. 

Efforts to obtain a new county. Meeting in St. George. Com- 
mittee select site for court-house. William Ewin sent to the 
Legislature. Judge John Brannon. Name of the county 
and county-seat 121 

CHAPTIOR VL 

SCHOOLS AND CHruCHKS. 

The influence of schools and churches. Should be co-workers. 
Growth slow but permanent. Counnon schools the greatness 
of the country. Home supjjly of teachers 125 

CHAPTER Vn. 

MOUNTAINS ANn CAVKS. 

Mountains of Tucker. Limestone mountains. Falling Spring. 
Jordan's Cave. Blooming Cave. Subterranean wonders 130 

CHAPTER VI II. 

LUMBER INTERESTS OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

Primeval forests. Description of trees. Sugar making. Saw 
mills. Cheat River. Springs. Wells. The blackness of the 
water of Cheat. To what due. History and description of 
the river. Alum Hill. Job's Ford. Slip Hill. Turn Eddy. 
Willow Point. St. (xeorge Eddy. IMiller Hill. IMurder Hole. 
Turtle Rocks. Seven Islands. Rafts and raftsmen. Shin- 
gle niills. Lund)er interests opposed to farming 139 



TABLE OF CONTENTS. 11 

CHAPTER IX. 

WEST VIRGINIA CEATRAIi AND PITTSBURGH RAILWAY. 

General view of the subject. Coal. Railroad plans of 1856 
1881. Reports. "Wealth of the company's lands 167 

CHAPTER X. 

MISCELLANEOUS STATISTICS. 

The value of statistics. Various lists and tables. Reports of 
County Superintendents 173 

CHAPTER XI. 

NEWSPAPERS OF THE COUNTY. 

First paper in Tucker County. Founding of the Pioneer. The 
Democrat comes into existence. The i)rogress of the two 
papers 190 

CHAPTER XII. 

THE ST. GEORGE BAR. 

Sketches of William Ewin. Rufus Maxwell. A. B. Parsons. 
Lloyd Hansford. L. S. Auvil. W. B. Maxwell. Philetus 
Lipscomb 198 

CHAPTER XIII. 

TRAVELERS. 

Abe Bonnifield. Starts to Missouri. Joins a show. Leaves it. 
Joins another. Rumpus with Indians. Goes to Canada, 
The old black scalawag. Returns home. Joins the Confed- 
erate army. Fights to the last. A. T. Bonnifield. Goes to 
California. Returns. Chased by a tiger at Nicaragua. Visits 
W. Va. Returns to California 206 

CHAPTER XIV. 

TRAVELERS.— (CONTINUED.) 

Captain Ezekiel Harpej. Early life. Volunteers to go to 
the Mexican war. Starts overland to California. The jour- 
ney. The Humboldt desert. Harper leaves the company. 
Proceeds on foot. Crosses stupendous mountains. Arrives 
at the gold fields. Digs gold to buy his breakfast. Various 
reverses and successes. Indian war. Harper leader of 



12 TABLE OF CONTENTS. 

the miners. Skirnii.shes with the Indians. Rescue of priso- 
ners. Tlie Indians driven from tlie country. Harper revis- 
its W. Va. Returns across the plains to California. Drives 
4000 sheep. Jacob Harper dies on the Rocky Mountains. 
Fortunes and reverses. Harper comes back to W. Va. Re- 
turns to Cahfornia. Terrible storm at sea. The "Central 
America" {?oes down. Letter from Aspinwall. Jerome Har- 
per goes to Chili. Insurrexion there. Prisoners sent to 
Patagonia. Captain Harper starts to hunt his brother. 
Meets him at Pataluma. Returns to the mines. Comes back 
to W. Va. and joins the Confederate army. Various skirm- 
ishes. Taken prisoner. Carried to Camp Chase and Rock 
Island. Suffering. Escape. After history 220 

CHAPTER XV. 

TRAVELERS. -(CONTINUED.) 

Henry Bonnifield. Early life. Adventures. Goes to Cali- 
fornia. Rides wild horses. Desperate ride over Millerton 
Mountain. Dragged by a wild horse. A wicked mule. In- 
vited to ride at the Centennial at Philadelphia. Goes to Ar- 
izona. Haunted house of Tulare. A lying emigrant. Mo- 
jave Desert. In Arizona. Sick. Lost in the desert. Falls 
into the hands of the Indians. Passes down the Colorado 
River. Trouble with the Indians. Reaches home 250 

CHAPTER XVI. 

TUAYKLERS.— (CONTINUED.) 

The Minears. Farm work. School. St. George Inn. A. P. 
Minear. Works on the B. & O. R. R. Starts to California. 
Adventures on the Isthnnis of Panama. Reaches California. 
Takensick. Kintlness of E. Harperand Mr. Buckelew. Goes 
into the lumber business. Fails. Goes to Oregon. Suc- 
cesses and reverses. John W. Minear goes to ("alifornia. To 
Oregon. A. C. Minear follows. Letters on the way. Sol- 
omon Minear killed. The Minears goto Idaho. Mining. Fam- 
ine. Snow. Storms. Attempt to jutirder A. 1'. Minear. 
Struck by sixteen bullets. Escapes. Joins a railroad enter- 
rpsie in Florida. Fails. Goes to New York. Returns to 
the Pacific coast and engages in mining. A. C. Minear in 
Idaho. Fights Indians. Letters. Returns to W. Va. David 
S. Minear 273 



TABLE OF CONTENTS. 13 

CHAPTER XVII. 

THE WAR. 

The commencement of the struggle in Tucker County. (Cap- 
ture of a Confederate flag at Saint George. Death of Lieut. 
Robert McCliesney. Letters bearing on the subject. Ad- 
vance of Garnett. Battle of Corrick's Ford. Confederates 
retreat. Capt. E. Harper pilots the flying army. Destruc- 
tion and ruin marked the way. The army deserted by the 
cavalry. Retreat of the Union forces from the Red House. 
E. Harper leads the scouts up Backbone Mountain. Escape 
of the army. The raids of Imboden. Surrender of Hall. 
Faris. Battle of St. George. Close of the war 316 

BRIEF BIOGRAPHIES. P , ''•' ^ 6 

In this department the subjects are treated alphabetically 438 

APPENDIX. 
Biographical sketch of the author 511 

APPENDIX. 

POLITICAL, STATISTICS. 

Election returns of the county 533 

Index. 573 



ILLUSTRATION S 



Capt. Ezekiel Harper, . 


Page 

Froiitispiece. 


W. B. Maxwell, 


. 202 


A. P. Minear, 






. 272 


A. T. Bounifield, 






. 482 


John G. Moore, . 






. 512 


The Maxwell Brothers — a groiiy 


*j 




. 176 


Lieut. Robert McChesney, 






. 320 


Dr. B. Baker, 






. 368 


Abraham Bounifield, 






. 512 


Rufus Maxwell, . 






. 450 


Capt. Joseph A. Paris, . 






. 320 


Mrs. Anna Minear, 






. 96 


Mrs. Sarah J. Maxwell, . 






. 176 


Mrs. Elizabeth Bounifiekh 






. 96 


Mrs. Mary J. Minear, 






. 320 


Mrs. Mary A. Spesert, . 






. 196 


Mrs. D. A. Lowther, 






. 196 


George A. Mayer, 






. 368 


David 8. Minear. 






. 320 


Jeft'. Lipscomb, . 






. 482 


Hu Maxwell, 






. 512 


Enoch Minear, . 






. 96 


Job Parsons, 






. 482 


Dr. A. E. Calvert. 






. 368 


IS^elsou D. Adams, 






. 320 


Philetus Lipscomb, 






. 482 


Cyrus H. Maxwell. 






. 512 


Dr. T. M. Austin, 






. 368 



HISTORY 



OF 



TUCKER COUNTY. 



CHAPTER I. 

J A M K ^ P A R S O 3" .S'. 

TucKEii County, AVest Virginia, is bomidecl ou tlie nortli 
by Preston, on the east hj Maryland and Grant Count}^ ; 
on the south it is bounded by Randolph, and on the west 
by Barbour. It lies along the valley of Cheat River, and 
includes the tributaries of that stream for about tliirt3--iive 
miles north and south, and twenty east and "west. The 
area of the count}^ would, therefore, be about seven hun- 
dred square miles; but, if an actual m(?asurement were 
made, the area would probably f;dl a little short of these 
figures. 

The county is not mentioned in history prior to the 
French and Indian War, about 1762. Of course, it is un- 
derstood that when the county is spoken of in this manner, 
refereuce is had only to the territory now included in the 
county of Tucker. The territory so considered appears to 
have been unknoAvn to civilized man till about the year 
1762 or 1763. The accounts of the earliest explorations 



18 HISTOEY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

are vague and conflicting-, and very few positive statements 
can be made on the subject. However, it is certain that 
both Preston and Eaudolpli were visited by white men be- 
fore Tucker was. 

Probably the first white man in the county was Captain 
James Parsons, Avho tlien lived on the South Branch of the 
Potomac, near Moorefield, in the present county of Hardy. 
During the French and Indian War, the Indians often 
passed from beyond^ the Ohio, across the Alleghany Mount- 
ains, into the settlements on the Potomac Eiver, and partic- 
ularly on the South Branch. They killed or carried away 
as prisoners everybody they could catch. On one of these 
raids they captured Capt. James Parsons." They carried 
him with them all the way to Ohio, and kept him a prisoner 
for some time. At length, however, he managed to escape 
from them and set out for home. He knew that the South 
Branch was in the east, and he traveled in that direction. 
He guided his course by the sun by day and the moon by 
night. But, as it was often cloud}', he wandered at times 
from his wa}-. In this manner he proceeded many daj's, 
and from the length of time that he had been on the road, 
he thought that he must be near the South Branch. He 
struck a small river, which he thought to be the South 
Branch, because it flowed in an easterly direction. He 
followed it until it emptied into a larger river, which floM-ed 
north. This stream he followed, thinking it might be a 
branch of the Potomac, flowing in this direction to pass 
around a mountain, and that it would turn east and south 
again in the course of a few miles. "With this impression 
lie followed it. But it did not turn east, and showed no 



* It Is HOW a (HU'stloii whetluT It was Parsons or anotlior mau. The best authorities 
say Parsons. 



JAMES PAKSONS. 19 

sign of turning. He became convinced that lie was on the 
wrong river, as indeed he was. The first river followed by 
him was the Bucldiannou. At its mouth he came to the 
Valley Eiver, and down it he had traveled in hopes that it 
would conduct him to Moorefield. 

As soon as he was satisfied that he was on the wrong 
river, he left it and turned eastward across the mountains. 
He passed Laurel Ridge somewhere near the head of Clover 
Kun, and came to Cheat above the Holly Meadows, proba- 
bly near the farm of Ward Parsons, Esq. He concluded 
that this must certainly be the South Branch, and followed 
down it. AVlien he reached the Horse Shoe "Bottom he was 
struck with the beauty of the country, and noticed in par- 
ticular the great forest of white oak trees that covered the 
whole bottom land of the river from the Holly MeadoAvs to 
the mouth of Horse Shoe Eun. The trees were nearly all 
of the same size, and there was little underbrush. 

Up to this time he had thought that the river must be 
the South Branch ; but, now he began to doubt it. It was 
too large. Already it was larger than the Branch was at 
Moorefield ; and, he knew that he must still be far above 
that town ; because no country like that in which he then 
was could be found near his home. He knew that, if it was 
the South Branch at all, he was above the mouth of both 
the North and South Forks, or upon one of those rivers. 
Neither was half as large as Cheat at the Horse Shoe. 
Therefore, he was certain that he was not on a tributary of 
'the Potomac. He was confirmed in this conviction when 
he had passed round the high point of land, where Judge 
S. E. Parsons now resides, and saw that the river, instead 
of continuing toward the north-east, broke away toward the 
west, and flowed in that direction as far as he could see. 



20 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

He could not divine where he was. He kneAV of no river of 
this kind anywhere in the west. For the first time, in all 
his wanderings, he became confused, and knew not where 
to go next. He would have followed down the river, in the 
hope that it would lead him to some settlement ; but, he 
felt sure that it must empty into the Ohio. 

After pondering over the matter for some time, he re- 
solved to continue his eastward course. He saw a long 
valley extending east ; and, crossing the river, he was at the 
mouth of Horse Shoe Run. As far as is known, he was the 
first white man ever in Tucker County. However, there is 
a tradition that a band of Indians, with a prisoner, once 
halted at the mouth of Horse Shoe Run ; and, leaving their 
prisoner tied on the bank of the river, tlie}^ went up the run 
after the lead. In a few hours they returned with some. 
Whether this event, if it happened at all, was before or after 
Captain Parsons was there, cannot now be determined. One 
account says that the prisoner was Captain Parsons' brother 
Thomas. But, all accounts of the subject are vague and 
conflicting. If the Indians got lead in that manner, it was 
probably some that they had hidden on a previous expedi- 
tion. There are not known to be any lead mines in that vi- 
cinity ; although some people think there are. It was a 
custom among the Indians, when they went upon an expe- 
dition, to hide lead along the road so that, upon their return, 
they might have a supply without carrj'ing it with them 
during the whole journe3\ This is likely why they went 
up the run to get that article, at the time mentioned. This 
probability^ is strengthened by the fact that an old Indian 
war path crossed Cheat River at the mouth of Horse Shoe 
Run ; and, if lead were left anywhere, it would likely be 
along a path. 



JAMES PAKSONS. 21 

When Captain Parsons crossed the river at the month of 
Horse Shoe Run, it was with the intention of continuing 
toward the east. This he did. He pursued his way up the 
stream a little distance, when he came upon a large, old 
path. It was perhaps an old Indian trail ; or it might have 
been made by animals. Parsons would have followed this ; 
but, it turned to the north, and he left it. At the mouth of 
Lead Mine, he left Horse Shoe Eun ; and, by going up Lead 
Mine, he crossed the Backbone Mountain near Fairfax. 

This path across the mountain was the route by which 
nearly all of the first settlers of Tucker found their way 
into the count}'. After crossing the mountain, Parsons 
struck the North Branch of the Potomac, and finally 
reached home. Of the Horse Shoe Bottom he gave an 
account that filled the settlers about Moorefield with long- 
ings to see it. But, it was several years before any of the 
people from the South Branch again visited the Cheat 
Hiver lands. 

At that time there was a large fort at the mouth of 
the Monongahela River, where Pittsburgh now stands. In 
1761, four of the soldiers who garrisoned the fort became 
dissatisfied and deserted. They passed up the Monon- 
gahela, and at the place where Geneva, Penn., now stands, 
they made them a camp. But, they did not like the place, 
and moved into Preston County, and made them another 
camp not far from Aurora. No one then lived anywhere 
near them, and for a year they saw no trace of human, ex- 
cept themselves. But, at length, one of them found a path 
leading sou.tli-east. He thought that it must go to Virginia, 
and he hurried back to camp and told his companions that 
they ought to follow the path and see where it would lead. 
They were all willing for this, and at once set out to trace 



22 HISTOKY OF TUCKEK COUNTY. 

tlie path. It is not now knoAvn who made the path or 
where it led to and from. But, the deserters followed it 
until it conducted them to Luney's Creek, in Grant County. 
Here they stumbled upon a frontier settlement ; for, the 
whites were jiist then colonizing the upper part of the 
South Branch, and the adjacent yalle3's. This was near 
•where Seymoursville now stands, and was not more than 
fifteen miles from where Captain Parsons lived, near Moore- 
field. 

This was in the vicinity of Fort Pleasant, where Dr. 
Eckarl}', from Preston Count}-, had been arrested on sus- 
picion, some six or eight years before. They suspected 
that he was a spy from the Indians. The South Branch 
was evidently a bad place for suspected characters. At any 
rate, the four deserters from Pittsburgh had been there but 
a short time when they were arrested as deserters. How- 
ever, two of them, brothers named Pringle, made their es- 
cape, and ran back to their camp in the glades of Preston. 

In the course of a few months, a straggler named Simp- 
son found his way to their camp, and rema,ined with them. 
By this time, hunters from the South Branch began to hunt 
frequently in the glades of Preston ; and the deserters felt 
insecure. They determined to move further west. Simp- 
son agreed to accompany them. The three men broke up 
their camp near Aurora, and took their way down Horse 
Shoe Run. At its mouth, they crossed into the Horse Shoe. 
After they had crossed the river, they fell to quarreling. 
The two Pringles took sides against Simpson, and drubbed 
him oft" to himself. He crossed to the Valley River. Not 
liking the country, he passed on to Harrison Count}', and, 
not far from Clarksburg, built him a camp. He made that 
locality his permanent home until the country about him 



JAMES PARSONS. 23 

began to be settled, five or six years later. Tlie Pringles 
likewise crossed to the Valley River, and ascending it to 
tlie moutli of tlie Buckliannon, passed up that river to* the 
month of Turkey Run, in Upshur County, where they made 
a camp in a hollow sycamore tree. 

We have no account of any other persons visiting Tucker 
for some years. The only occupants were wild animals 
that filled the woods, or wild Indians who occasionally 
roamed up and down the valleys. It is possible that Simou 
Kenton was on the river at the Horse Shoe in the summer 
of 1771. He had had a fight with a man in Yirginia, 
and thought he had killed him. He fled westward and 
reached Cheat River. It may have been at the Horse 
Shoe; but, more probably it was in Preston Count}-. At 
that time, Kenton was only sixteen 3-ears old. He after- 
wards went to Kentucky and became one of the most illus- 
trious characters in all border history. 

When first visited by white men, there were no Indians 
who made the territory of Tucker their permanent home. 
If they came within it at all, it was only to pass through, 
or to hunt for game. Many people hold quite erroneous 
ideas concerning the Indians who used to kill people and 
do all manner of wickedness in West Virginia. Some sup- 
pose that they lived all over the valley's and mountains like 
bears and panthers, and in an unguarded moment would 
run into a settlement, murder all the people the}- could 
catch, and then retreat to the woods, and skulk about 
through the brush like wild animals until a chance came of 
killing somebody else. This Avas not the case. No Indians 
have made Tucker County their home, so far as is known, 
since before Columbus. Undoubtedl}', they once lived here ; 
but they had long been gone when first the white man 



24 HISTOEY OF TUCKEE COUNTY. 

came; and iiotbiiifjj but gi'aves, remnants of arrows and 
other implements, found scattered about the ground, tokl 
that the}' had ever made this part of the valley of Cheat 
their home. Nor was the land Ijetween the Ohio Eiver and 
the Alleghaii}- Mountains, now "West Tirginia, the country 
of Indians at the coming of th« whites. A few scattered 
lints and two or three little towns were all that our state 
contained of the living Indian race. But, in earlier times, 
they had lived here, as their remains now prove ; and there 
is reason for believing that the country was tolerably thickly 
inhabited. Why they deserted the land, or what became of 
them, is a question that none now can answer. It is useless 
to put out theories on the subject. Of all specimens of 
human weakness, a mere theory, unsupported l)y evidence, 
deserves most to be pitied. We know that there was a time 
"when West Virginia and Tucker County had inhabitants, 
and we know that those inhabitants were Indians; but 
further than this, nothing is certain. What became of the 
tribes — whether they departed for a l)etter countr}', or 
whether the}- Avere exterminated b}' some stronger nation, 
or whether some plague carried them off — we do not pre- 
tend to say. Any o])inion on the subject is only guesswork, 
because no man knows. 

It is not theory, however, to say that before West Virginia 
was inhabited by the Indians, ^tliere was another race 
of people living here. They are called 3Loun</huikhrt<, 
because they usually biiilt mounds in countries where 
they lived. There may have been Indians here before the 
Moundl)ui]d(>r came, and there certainly were after he de- 
parted, l)ut, there is no evidence that the two races occu- 
pied the same countr}- at the same time. A thousand the- 
ories are extant concerning the origin and fate of that mys- 



JAMES PAKSONS. 25 

tei'ious race, Avliicli built tlie ten thousand mounds and for- 
tifications in the Ohio and Mississippi valleys ; but, no man 
Imows whence they came, when they came, how long they 
remained or when or why they left, or whether they were 
white or black, or what w^as their religion or their laws, or 
who they were. However, it is tolerably well established 
that they ceased to be a people in the United States at 
least nine hundred years ago. Indeed, from all the evidence 
in the case, one is nearly obliged to believe that the mounds 
of the west are as old as the Tower of Babel. 

It is not certain that the Moundbuilders ever lived in 
Tucker ; but, there is a little ground for attributing to them 
the small mound in the Horse Shoe, on the farm of S, B. 
Wamsley, Esq. The mound in question is about forty feet 
in circumference and four or live high. It is on the first 
terrace above the river. It may be the w^ork of Indians ; 
but, it is more probably the remains of the Moundbuilders, 
,who had their center of empire in Ohio, and extended their 
frontiers over nearly all the land of the Mississippi Valley, 
east of Texas and Kansas. Nobody knows what the mounds 
were built for. They Avere constructed of earth and loose 
stones, sometimes of sand, and occasionally fragments of 
wood were found in them. Some of the structures seem to 
have been used for fortifications, some as churches, or rather 
temples, and some may have been built as tombs for great 
men. But, this is not a settled point. In some of them, 
altars with charred human bones among ashes have been 
found. This suggests that the Moundbuilders offered hu- 
man sacrifice to their idols, as the Mayas and people of 
Mexico did. Some think it probable that the Mound- 
builders were originally a colony from Mexico. Skeletons 
in the mounds have led some persons to conclude that the 



2G HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

mounds were built for tombs. It would be as reasonable to 
conclude that a stack of hay Avas built for a rat because a 
rat's nest was found in it. Yet, doubtless, some mounds 
are only the huge graves of kings. But, no doubt, very 
many of the bones and relics found in mounds and hastily 
attributed to the Moundbuilders, are only the old carcasses 
of Indians, and Indian whimwhams. It is a known fact 
that the Indians often buried their dead in the mounds. 

Although many of tlia relics taken from the mounds are 
counterfeit, yet some are surely genuine. From these we 
learn that the Moundbuilders were not much larger or much 
smaller than the average Indians. The accounts of skele- 
tons of giants thirty feet long, dug out of the ground, are 
not to be believed. It is doiibtful if a race of people, much 
larger than able-bodied Englishmen of to-da}', has ever been 
in existence. 

The mound in the Horse Shoe is known to have been the 
burial place of human beings ; but, it is not known that it 
was built for that purpose. Ground-hogs that dig their holes 
in it, used to throw out pieces of human bones. But, this 
is no evidence that the bones were from the skeletons of 
Moundbuilders. In fact, there are many reasons for be- 
lieving that they were Indian bones. An old Indian village 
stood on the bank of the river, less than a mile above the 
mound. Indian skeletons have been found in other places 
about the river, and there is no reason why they ma}' not 
have buried some in this mound, as they did in other 
mounds whenever they had an opportunity of doing so. In 
early days, the river used to wash bones from its bank, 
where stood the village. Captain Parsons and Samuel 
Bonnifield once found a jaw bone so large that it could l)e 
placed in position on the outside of their faces. A thigh 



JAMES PAESONS. 27 

bone, also enormous, is reported to haye been pulled out of 
tlie river bank at the same. place. The bone was said to 
have been so long that when stood on the ground beside a 
man it reached up under his arms. This magnitude was 
probably due to excited fanc}-, like that possessed by the 
Indian, who returned from traveling and reported that he 
had seen a race of men whose ears hung down to their hips. 

The Moundbuilders must have been an agricultural peo- 
ple ; because, a population as dense as theirs could not have 
lived in any other manner. Then, it is probable that the 
Horse Shoe was, long years ago, farmed something after 
the manner that it is now. But, the ancient people have 
left no trace that they had horses, oxen, any iron or steel 
tools or any kind of machinery, except such as they could 
make of wood, shells, stone and copper. But, whether or 
not the river bottom, from the Holly Meadows to St. George, 
was once a thriving settlement, and corn fields covered it 
from one end to the other, yet when the first white men vis- 
ited it, it showed no sign of ever having been tilled. Noth- 
ing but the little mound, above referred to, is left to tell 
that the Moundbuilders ever lived ; and, this mound is not 
conclusive evidence of the presence of that ancient race. 

But, one thing is certain : Tucker County was once the 
home of Indians. The Indians of America seem to have 
belonged to one general race, the same as the people of Eu- 
rope belong to one. The Indians are divided into numerous 
tribes, nations, families and confederations. These differ in 
language and customs. How the Indians got to America is 
unknown ; and it is only wasting time to ofl'er theories upon 
the subject. There is about as much reason for believing 
that the old world was peopled from the new as that the 
new was colonized from the old. Each continent may have 



28 HISTORY OP TUCKER COUNTY. 

bad a people indigenous to itself. The Esquimaux of Alaska 
and the Siberians are known to cross and re-cross Behring 
Strait, and America may have received its inhabitants from 
Asia in that manner. The islands of Polynesia are known 
to be sinking. Some of them are believed to have sunken 
ten thousand feet, so that the islands now above water are 
only the mountains and table lands of a submerged conti- 
nent extending from the coast of Asia nearly or quite to that 
of America. Indians may have come from that continent to 
America. The Telegraph Plateau, from New Foundland to 
Ireland, has the appearance of an isthmus that once con- 
nected Europe and America. It is now under water, Imt so 
near the surface that icebergs lodge on it. This may have 
been the Island of Atlantis that some of the old heathen 
writers say was swallowed up in an earthquake. If so, the 
tribes of America may have come from Europe. 

It is useless to speculate on this. It can be proven with 
equal conclusiveness that the Indians are mixed with Welsh, 
Japanese, Norwegians, Jews and Carthagenians. It is un- 
known where they came from or who they Avere before they 
came. We take them as we find them. 

What tribe inhabited Tucker County is not known. Jef- 
ferson says that it was the Massawomee. It may have 
been ; and for all the difference, we may consider that it 
"was. They were gone when first the white man came, and 
nothing but graves and other relics told that they were ever 
here. 

We cannot tell why they departed from this part of the 
State ; ])ut, they all, except a few little towns, left for some 
country unknown to us. We cannot tell why they aban- 
doned the country. War may have exterminated them, or 
they may have gone to occupy a better land. Cusick, an 



1 JAMES PARSONS. 29 

educated Indian, Avrote a book about the Indians, and said 
tliat many tribes wanted the Monongahela valley, and not 
being able to agree, tliey lield a council and decided tliat all 
should leave it. But, this story is not to be credited. Cu- 
sick did not know au}^ more about it than he had read in 
books or had fabricated himself. The Indians knew no 
more of their history than the white people knew — not as 
much, for that matter. 

The Indians who killed people in West Virginia generally 
came from Ohio; but, some came from Pennsylvania and 
Indiana. Ohio was full of Indians. They had towns on 
the Muskingum, Tuscarawas, Hockhocking, Scioto, San- 
dusky, Maumee, Miami and all through the intervening 
country. The meanest Indians were those on the Sandusky 
and Scioto. During the winter they did not often bother 
the settlements; because they were too lazy to provide 
themselves clothes to keep them from freezing in cold 
weather, and had to lie in their huts by the lire. But, as 
soon as the spring came and the weather began to get 
warm, they crawled from their dens, and fixed up their guns, 
knives and tomahawks for a raid upon the settlements. 
They traveled alwut twenty miles a day, unless in a hurry. 
If they set out from the Scioto Biver on the first of May, 
they would reach the Ohio somewhere between Point 
Pleasant and Wheeling in from four to seven days. They 
would cross that river on a raft of logs, and if they were 
aiming for Cheat Fiiver they would reach it in from four to 
seven days longer, provided they did not stop on the way. 

When they came into a settlement they would hide in 
fence corners and in brier thickets until the}^ saw a chance 
of killing somebody. Then they would lea]> out and sieze 
their victim. They sometimes killed and sometimes carried 



30 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

away as prisouers those whom they could catch. If they 
carried a prisoner ott", they woiikl tie his hands and make 
him walk between two warriors. If they had plenty to eat, 
they gave the prisoner plenty ; but if their provisions were 
scarce, they gave him very little. When they got him to 
Ohio they sometimes turned him loose in a field, and all the 
Indians got after him with clubs and rocks and pounded 
him to death. Sometimes they tied him to a tree and 
burnt him ; and sometimes they adopted him into their 
tribe and treated him well. A prisoner never knew what 
fate awaited him, and always tried to escape. 

But, the Indians always watched so close that a prisoner 
seldom got awa}'. It was an unlucky thing for a prisoner 
to try to escape and fail. It matle the Indians mad, and 
they would show little mercy afterwards. Indeed, it was a 
perilous thing to fall into the hands of the Indians at any- 
time ; and many people would be killed before taken cap- 
tive by them. If they got a grudge against a prisoner, he 
had a poor show of ever getting away. Simon Kenton, who 
was on Cheat River in 1771, five years before the foimdin^ 
St. George, was once captured by the Indians. He had 
stolen seventeen of their horses, and when they caught him 
they put him in a field and three hundred of them tried to 
1X)und him to death ; but, he whipped them out eight 
times and got away- They tied him up three times to 
roast him ; but he still got away and escaped to Kentucky. 
But, he M'as more fortunate than the most of prisoners; and, 
besides, ho was such a terrible fighter that they were afraid 
of him. 

The Indians in Tucker had a town in the Horse Shoe, 
opposite the lower end of Sycamore Island. The traces of 
the village may still be seen in summer on account of the 



JAMES PARSONS. 31 

weeds tliat grow larger there tliau on tlie adjacent lands. 
This is the place that the bones are washed out of the bank. 
On the other side of the river, one mile above St. George, 
are numerous Indian graves. It used to be reported that 
there were five hundred graves within half a mile ; but the 
writer took the pains to count them, and could not find 
more than forty-six. They are rude heaps of stone, and 
extend along the side of the hill in an irregular manner. 
Some of them have been opened. Nothing was ever found 
in them. They are probably very old. An old account says 
that a battle was fought there between two tribes of Indi- 
ans ; but there is not a shadow of foundation for the story, 
except the graves. Why so many Indians should have 
been buried so near together is hard to account for, imless 
they were killed in battle, or by some other violent means. 
But this does not prove that a battle was fought. Proljably 
there was a town near, and this Avas the graveyard. 

The Indians used arrows tipped with Hint. Many of 
these flints are found scattered aliout the country. Where 
the Indians got the material from Avliich they made them is 
now unknown. The making of the arrow points was a pro- 
fession among the Indians. The}- had men who made it a 
business. One of these factories is believed to have been 
situated on Horse Shoe Eun, where Pv. Maxwell's barn now 
stands. When the ground was first j)lowed it was covered 
with bits of flint and broken points, and everything indi- 
cated that a shop for manufacturing flint points had form- 
erly been there. 

The French and Indian War closed in 1764. After that, 
came a wonderful immigration to the West. West Virginia 
and Kentucky were the main points to which settlers 
flocked. West Yirginia was soon spotted all over with col- 



32 HISTOllY OF TUCKEK COUNTY. 

onies. Withiu six j-ears, settlements were on all the prin- 
cipal rivers. But none were 3'et in Tncker. Capt. James 
Parsons knew of the Horse Shoe Bottom, and was only 
waiting for a suitable time to lay patents on the lands. 
Sometime before 1774, probably about 1772, he and his 
brother Thomas came over to Cheat from Moorefield, to 
look at the lands and select them favorable places. James 
chose the Horse Shoe, and Thomas all the land from the 
mouth of Horse Shoe Run to the Holly Meadows, exclusive 
of the Horse Shoe. They afterward obtained patents for 
these lands ; and James bought some other tracts, among 
which was the farm since owned by the Bonnifields, on 
Horse Shoe Run. This was originall}- a " corn right." 

These lands were marked out at the time of their selec- 
tion, but, in 177-4, as shall be seen in the next chapter, a 
colon}' from the South Branch built a fort in the Horse 
Shoe, and cleared some of the land. But, in two years, 
John Minear, leader of the colon}-, removed to St. George, 
on land of his own. 

When the Parsons brothers were passing back and forth 
between Moorefield and the Hors-', Shoe, there was not an}-- 
particular war between the white people and the Indians. 
But, the Indians were always ready to kill a man when they 
could find him b}- liiuiself in the woods. The}- would be 
still more likely to do this if he had a good gun and a horse. 
These were articles which the Indians always wanted, and 
they would plunder a man of these whenever they got a 
good chance. James and Thomas Parsons always rode 
splendid horses, and the straggling bands of Indians who 
roamed along Cheat were very anxious to steal them. They 
woiild have killed the riders to get the horses. 

In this state of affairs it was dangerous for two men to 



JOHN MINEAR. 33 

come alone so far into the mlderness. But, in spite of 
danger, Captain Parsons and his brother came often Mhile 
they were surveying and locating their land. The}- crossed 
the Backbone and Alleghany mountains near the Fairfax 
Stone. In order that they might the more successfully 
elude the Indians, they were accustomed to put the shoes 
on their horses, toes behind, so that the Indians would be 
deceived in the direction in which the horses had gone. 

On one occasion Captain Parsons had come alone from 
Moorefield. He had visited his land, and had just crossed 
the river at the mouth of Horse Shoe Bun, when an Indian, 
hidden in the weeds near by, gobbled like a turke}'. The 
savage probably thought that he could decoj- his man v.ithin 
gunshot; but in this he was mistaken. Captain Parsons 
was too well posted in Indian tricks to be trapped in such 
a manner. Instead of going to kill the turkey-, he put spurs 
to his horse and reached Moorefield that night, a distance 
of near seventy miles. The path was through the woods, 
and crossed the Alleghan}' Mountains. These were the 
first locations of lands in Tucker County. The next chapter 
will relate to the settlement of these lands, and of others 
taken up near the same time by John Minear, Bobert Cun- 
ningham, Henry Fink and John GofFe. 

The first explorers and settlers of the county were the 
Parsons and Minear families. The main part of the 
county's history has been enacted hj the representatives 
of one or the other of these. 



CHAPTER II. 
J UN MINE A n . 

As NEARLY as cau now be ascertained, JoLn Minear first 
visited Tucker County in tlie year 1773. He M'as a native 
of Germany, where he was born about 1730. It has been 
said that he was a soldier under Frederick the Great ; but 
the truth of this is not well authenticated. In 1767, he 
came to America. He was already married, and brought 
with him a small family, among whom Avas David Minear, 
then twelve years of age. 

John Minear bought land on the Potomac River, and 
lived there until 177-4. He had heard the reports brought 
back by Capt. James Parsons, and he determined to visit 
the new countr}- and see it for himself. Whether any one 
accompanied him or not, is not stated ; but, probabl}', he 
was not alone in his series of explorations, which he made 
in 1773. He visited the country along Cheat Ptiver, from 
the Holly Meadows to Licking Falls ; and, having selected a 
suitable farm in the Horse Shoe, he returned to the Poto- 
mac for his family. 

So great was his influence, and so general was the desire 
for emigration, that he found little difficulty in gathering 
about him quite a company of farmers, willing to risk their 
fortunes in the new land. He was the leader of the colony, 
and all placed confidence in his judgment and trust in his 
braver}-. His education was in advance of the farmers of 
his time ; and, those who came with him looked upon him, 
not only as a military leader in expected wars with the In- 
dians, but also as a counselor in civil aft'airs, in the settle- 



JOHN MINEAE. 35 

ment of lands and the deeds and riglits appertaining 
thereto. How many came with him i's not known. The 
names of a few survive, and we know that there were others. 
They did not come merely to explore the country and 
speculate in lands ; but, they brought with them their fami- 
lies, their household goods, and what movable property 
they could, and had no other intention than that of making 
the valley of Cheat their permanent home. 

They reached their destination early in 1774, probably in 
March. They spent the first night in the woods, not far 
from the crossing at Willow Point. The men at once com- 
menced work on a fort, which they built as a defense 
against the Indians. The fort was nothing more than a 
large log house, with holes left between the logs through 
which the inmates could shoot at Indians. The buildina* 
stood on or near the spot where now stands the residence 
of S. E, Parsons. It Avas used as a fort and also as a dwell- 
ing house for all the families. It was made large enough 
to give room for all. In the daytime, the men went to the 
Avoods to clear cotu fields, and left the woman and children 
in the fort. If any alarm was given of Indians, the men 
would run to the fort, and bar the doors, and watch through 
the cracks in the walls for the coming of the enemy. They 
never lay down to sleep without locking the doors to keep 
the Indians out. 

For awhile everything w^ent well in their new home. As 
the spring came on, the w^eather got warm and delightful, 
and the huge oaks and gigantic chestnut trees came out in 
leaf. The men worked hard, and soon had cleared the logs 
and trees fi'om several small corn fields, which they planted 
as soon as the frost was all out of the ground. The settlers 
sometimes were out of bread and had to live on meat ; but, 



36 HISTOEY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

venison and bear meat were plentiful, and tliere was no 
danger of starving. "VMiat corn and wheat they had was 
earned on pack horses from the Potomac River. 

Early in the summer, new danger from the Indians began 
to be feared. Up to this time, there had been no actual 
hostilitv, except an occasional murder of an Indian by a 
white man or of a white man by an Indian. Even this had 
not disturbed the settlement in the Horse Shoe. But, A\ith 
the return of the spring, in 1774, a war seemed certain. 
Along the Ohio, above and below Wheeling, several murders 
were committed, both by white men and by Indians. 
Greathouse, a white man, fell upon a camp of Indians a 
few miles above Wheeling, and killed men and women. This 
so enraged the Indians that they at once commenced war 
upon all the settlements west of the Alleghany Mountains. 
The principal settlements in West Yirginia then were on the 
Monongahela, the VaUey River, the West Fork and on the 
Greenbrier, Kanawha and the Ohio. The small fort in the 
Horse Shoe cannot be reckoned as a settlement. But the 
Indians soon found it out. In fact, it was on a famous war 
path that crossed the river at the mouth of Horse Shoe Run, 
and the Indians who would walk to and fro along this path 
must necessarily find the fields. 

Early in the summer of 1774, Colonel McDonald, with a 
few hundred men, marched into Ohio and burnt some In- 
dian towns on the Muskingum River. Nobod}^ but Indians 
lived in Ohio then, and they were furious when the white 
men burnt the toAVTis and cut down all their corn. As soon 
as McDonald left the country, the Indians hurried across 
the river, and commenced killing people and burning houses 
and barns in revenge for the treatment received at his hand. 
The settlers who lived nearest the Ohio vere in the greatest 



JOHN MINEAK. 37 

danger, but all west of the Alleghany Monntams were un- 
safe. Minear's colony in the Horse Shoe soon found occa- 
sion for alarm. Indian tracks were discovered not far from 
the fort, and the people were in constant fear of being mas- 
sacred. Nobody went beyond the reach of the guns of the 
fort, except with the greatest caution. But, they had to 
hunt through the woods for venison and other meat ; for, 
the corn was not yet ripe enough for bread. Sometimes the 
hunters were chased by the savages, as was the case with 
one of the men who went to the Sugar Lands, on the Back- 
bone Mountain, some four miles east from the fort. He was 
hunting, and looking at the country, v/hen he heard strange 
noises on the hill above him, and immediatel}^ heard an- 
swers from the valley below. He knew at once that it was 
Indians trying to trap him, having nearly surrounded him 
already. He affected not to notice the noises; but, he 
started off at a rapid rate down a cove that led into Coburn 
Run. When he ]3assed over the bluff in his descent to the 
run, the noise of the Indians, who were whistling to each 
other and gobbling like turkeys, died away in the distance, 
and for some time he heard nothing more of it. However, 
he did not slacken his speed, but hurried down the rocky 
bed of the run, and had gone nearly two miles when he was 
suddenly startled by a hooting like that of an owl, on the 
hill near above him. The imitation was not so perfect but 
that he could detect that it was not an owl. He knew that 
it was an Indian. He was yet three miles from the fort, and 
only by flight could he hope to escape. The channel of the 
stream was rocky, full of cataracts and falls, and trees that 
had lopped into the ravine from both sides. Over and 
through these blockades and obstacles he ran as fast as he 
could, and with as little noise as possible. From this point, 



38 HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

there are two accounts of tlie affair. One says that, as he 
was climbing down over a fall, an Indian came sliding 
down the hill within a few steps of him. The Indian was 
snatching and grabbing at brush, and seemed to be doing 
his best to stop himself. It is thought that he had tried to 
run along the side of the hill, which was very steep, and, 
missing his footing, could not regain it until he slid nearly 
to the run, and was almost under the hunter's feet. But 
the hunter saw his enemy just in time to escape. He 
wheeled and ran under the falls of the creek into a dry cav- 
ern beyond. Then, turning, he discharged his gun at the 
Indian ; but, there is no evidence that the shot took effect. 
The Indian seemed to think that the white man was shoot- 
ing at him from under the water ; and, scrambling and claw- 
ing back up the hill, he disappeared in the weeds. The 
hunter made use of the opportunity and escaped to the fort. 
The summer of 1774 was passing away ; and danger from 
the Indians did not lessen. It is not recorded that any of 
the settlers were killed ; but, all must have felt that the 
peril of the colony was great ; for, late in the summer it be- 
gan to be considered whether it would not be better to 
abandon the fort and retreat to the Potomac. This was 
about the time that Lord Dunmore and General Lewis were 
organizing their army for a general campaign against the 
Indians in Ohio. Probably the settlers in the Horse Shoe 
heard of the gathering strife, and knowing that hard fighting 
was at hand, thought it best to retire beyond the Alleglia- 
nies till the storm should pass away. Be this as it may, 
early in the fall of that j^ear, 1774, the people of the Horse 
Shoe collected together what they could of their property, 
and fled to the Potomac. The fort, the small fields and all 
the improvements were thus abandoned; and, during the 



JOHN MINEAK. 39 

winter of 1774-5, there was not a white man in Tucker 
County, so far as is now known. 

John Minear and his colony remained on the Potomac 
about eighteen months. Whether they all remained to- 
gether, as they had lived in the Horse Shoe, can not now 
be stated. Nor is it known who composed the colony, fur- 
ther than a few names. But, they could not content them- 
selves to give up the valley of Cheat forever. They were 
only waiting for a more auspicious season for founding a 
permanent settlement. 

The next we hear of John Minear, he was again on 
Cheat, and was building up a colony on the site of the 
present town of St. George. For some reason, he did nob 
return to the Horse Shoe, but chose St. George in its stead. 
What influenced him to this choice is unknown. But, it is 
probable that Capt. James Parsons had by that time se- 
cured the pre-emption of the Horse Shoe lands; and 
Minear, desirous of having the colony on his own lands, 
moved three miles further down the river, and located at 
the mouth of Mill Run, where the county seat of Tucker 
has since been built. It cannot be ascertained in what 
year Parsons secured his- grant of the lands above St. 
George ; but, it is well known that they were for a long 
time in dispute between him and Minear, and the final set- 
tlement .at the land office gave the Horse Shoe lands to 
Parsons. The greater part of this land is still in the Par- 
sous family, having descended in an unbroken line of suc- 
cession from Captain Parsons to its present owners, Joseph 
and S. E. Parsons. 

The emigrants which Minear led to St. George were not 
identical with those whom he conducted to the county in 
1774. Some who had come in that year did not return in 



40 HISTOEY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

1770 ; wliile some came iu 177(5 for tlie first time. Nor do 
Ave know tlie number of those who came in 1776. In addi- 
tion to John Minear and his two sons, David and Jonathan, 
and several daughters, and other women, there were men 
named Miller, Cooper, Goffe- and Cameron. John Miuear's 
land claim was along the north side of the river, from St. 
George down the river two miles. On the other side, but 
not extending as far east as St. George, was the claim of 
Jonathan Minear, John's son. Cooper's land was two miles 
further down the river, at the foot of Miller Hill. Cameron 
h>i'ated on the opposite side of the river from Miller Hill. 

John Minear's land, like that of James Parsons, has con- 
tinued in the Minear family to this day. It is now the 
property of D. S. Minear, Esq. 

During the early j^ears of the colony at St. George, there 
i? on recortl nothing that hindered its prosperity. The 
first step of the settlers was to build a fort as a defense 
against the Indians. This fort stood on the ground where 
now stands the Court-house. It was a better fort than the 
one in the Horse Shoe, and was also four times as large. 
It was composed of a large log house, surrounded by 
palisades. 

The logs, of Avhicli the house was biiilt, were notched and 
fitted close, one upon another; and, so w'ell Avere they 
placed that there was left not a crevice through wdiich In- 
dians could shoot. But, in the upper story, openings Avere 
made between the logs, so that those in the house could 
shoot at ai)i)roaching Indians. The chimnc}' ran up on the 
inside. This Avas to prevent the Indians from getting to the 
roof by climbing x\p the chimney. There Avere no AvindoAvs 

• Tills iiiiinc nuiM not be confoTuulecl with tli;it of James (ioff, who settled on the 
river neai' the Preston County line. 



JOHN MINEAE. 41 

in the fort. Light was admitted tliroiigh the port-holes, as 
the openings between the logs were called. In cold weather, 
or when no light was wanted, blocks of wood were fitted in 
the port-holes. The door was made of, split boards, so 
thick that bullets would not go through. The fort was 
surrounded by palisades, or a line of stout posts planted 
firmly in the ground side by side and fitted closely together. 
These posts vrere about twelve feet high. They resembled 
a huge paling fence, and enclosed over one fourth of an 
acre of ground. The fort stood in the center of the enclos- 
ure, which was higher ground, and gave the inmates com- 
mand of the neighboring fields. No Indian could approach 
in the daytime without running great risk of being shot. 

Among the first improvements in the colony was a mill at 
St. George, near where tlid school-house now stands. The 
mill-race, and some of the old timbers of the dam, are yet to 
be seen. The mill was intended only for grinding corn. At 
that time, no wheat, rye or buckwheat was grown in the 
count}'. 

During the first four ye&vs the settlement prospered 
greatly. New emigrants came into the country, and brought 
horses, cows and domestic animals Avith them. But, there 
was constant anxiety lest the Indians should break into the 
settlement. In the winter there was not so much fear, be- 
cause the half clad savages did not travel through the siiow 
when it could be avoided. They would be in danger of 
fi'eezing to death ; and they preferred to remain in their 
huts on the other side of the Ohio Paver. But, when spring 
came, all the wigwams and" Shawanese dens poured out 
their warriors ; and West Virginia, Kentucky and western 
Pennsylvania were overrun by warlike savages. It was 
thus at the commencement of the year 1780. That year 



42 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

will ever be memorable in border history on account of the 
raids and murders by the Indians upon the white people. 
But, it is not so famous in that respect as 1777 and 1782. 
But, so far as Tucker County is concerned, the years 1780 
and 1781 were the most disastrous in the Indian Wars. St. 
George was then the most flourishing settlement on Cheat 
River, and they soon learned the paths that led to the new 
country. It may be borne in mind that Tucker was natur- 
ally one of the most secluded localities in the State, being 
even less exposed to Indian attacks than Preston was. 
Randolph, and the more southern counties along the western 
base of the Alleghanies, were well known to the Indians, 
who, in the French and Indian War, had passed to and fro 
through them while making raids into Virginia. But, 
there was no occasion for passing through Tucker ; and, if 
occasional . bands of Indians did so, as in the case of the 
capture of James Parsons, the}' did it for the purpose of 
hunting or making explorations. Not so W'itli the counties 
along the Ohio, and on the Monongahela and Kanawha. 
The Indians from Ohio could cross over at any time, and 
within a short distance find a thriving settlement to plun- 
der. Before they could reach Tucker or Preston, they 
would have to pass through several inhabited counties, 
which the Indians did not like to do, because the settlers 
might track them. But, Tucker's isolated position and its 
high mountain defenses did not exempt it from its full 
share of Indian outrages. The first of these was in the 
spring of 1780. 

The band of Indians who made this incursion into Tucker, 
were remarkably persevering in their pursuit of wickedness. 
Very early in the spring of 1780 they crossed the Ohio in 
the vicinity of Parkersburg, and made their way unobserved 



JOHN MINEAK. 43 

into Lewis County, wliere tliey suddenly appeared before a 
fort on Hacker's Creek, known in early times as West's 
Fort. There were only a few men in the fort, and they 
were afraid to go out to fight the enemy. The Indians did 
not make an attack on the house, but lay hid near about in 
the woods, ready to shoot any one who should come out. 
The people thus penned in, were on the point of starving, 
and knew not whence deliverance was to come. Buckhan- 
non was the nearest place where assistance could be ob- 
tained, and that was sixteen miles. One in going there 
would be exposed to almost certain death, for the Indians 
were entirely round the fort. 

One of the inmates, Jesse Hughes, was a man who shrunk 
from no duty and quailed at no danger. He was the most 
successful Indian fighter in West Virginia, except theZanes 
of Wlieeling, Captain Brady and Lewis Wetzel. He had 
passed through scores of hair-breadth escapes, and had 
fought the Indians for eleven years and knew their nature 
w^ell. He it was who explored the country westward from 
Buckhannon. He discovered and gave name to the West 
Fork River, and was the first white man w^lio stood on the 
site of Weston. This was in 1769. From that time till the 
close of the Indian wars, in 1795, he was ever where brave 
men were most needed, in the front. To him Clarksburg 
almost owed its existence. There Avas scarcely a settlement 
in the central part of the State that did not profit by the 
bravery and courage of Jesse Hughes. Even St. George, 
sixty miles distant, had occasion to thank him, although his 
assistance did not o.vert the disasters which are now to be 
recorded. 

He was in West's Fort when the Indians besieged it. 
His farm was almost within sight of the fort, and he Iiad 



44 HISTORY OP TUCKER COUNTY. 

sought slielter there in common with his neighbors. After 
the place had been invested for some time, and the inmates 
were getting short of provisions, while the enemy showed 
no disposition to raise the siege, it began to grow manifest 
that something must be done to procure help in driving the 
Indians off, or the place must fall. The plan most practi- 
cable seemed that of sending some one to Buckhannon Avitli 
intelligence of the distress, and bring help from thence. 
Hughes volunteered to go ; and, on a dark night, he slipped 
from the fort, broke by the Indians, and ran to Buckhan- 
non. He collected a company of men and at once started 
back. He arrived about daylight, and it was thought best 
to abandon the fort. This was done. The inmates, men, 
women and children, proceeded to Buckhannon. On the 
way the Indians tried to sejDarate the company so as to at- 
tack it, but, in this they failed, and the settlers all reached 
Buckhannon in safety. 

The Indians followed on to Buckhannon and prowled 
about the settlement a few days. They waylaid some men 
who were going to the fort, and one of them named Curl 
w^as shot in the chin. All the other men, five in number, 
started to run ; but Curl called to them to stand their 
ground, for they could whip the Indians. But, the men 
were some distance away, and a powerful Indian warrior 
drew a tomahawk and started at Curl, who was now alone 
and wounded. Nothing daunted, he raised his gun to shoot 
the Indian. But, the blood from his wound had dampened 
the poAvder, and the gun missed fire. Instantly picking up 
another gun, which had been dropped in the excitement, 
he shot the savage and brought him to the ground. The 
Indians then retreated. 

One of the whites ran after them alone, and being a re- 



JOHN MINEAE. 45 

markable rimner, lie quickly overtook tliem and shot an- 
other Indian. The other Indians got behind trees ; and, in 
a few minutes, the rest of the whites came u]) and renewed 
the fight. One of the whites was shot through the arm ; 
and, a third Indian, who was hiding behind a log, received 
a bullet which caused him to go howling away. In a fcAV 
minutes the whole band of savages took to flight, and night 
coming on put a stop to the pursuit. 

Early next morning fifteen men took the trail of the In- 
dians and followed them several miles, and finally found 
where they were hidden in a laurel thicket. As they a]3- 
proached, one of the whites was shot ; but, the Indians got 
away. However, the settlers found several Indian horses 
with their legs tied together. The Indians had left their 
animals in this fix to keep them from running off. The set- 
tlers took them back to Buckhaunon. For several days 
nothing more was seen of the Indians ; and, in the hope 
that the savages had left the country, some of the people 
returned to their farms. But, the enemj^ were not gone. 
They killed a man and took a young lady prisoner. The 
people fled back to the fort, and the Indians found no fur- 
ther opportunity for doing mischief at that time. 

Thus far, the savages had raided through Lewis and Up- 
shur counties. They now passed into Randolph, where 
they continued to murder the people and burn property. 
They first made their appearance in the up]3er end of Ty- 
gart's Valley. This was in March. A man in passing along 
the path saw moccasin tracks in the mud. He stopped to 
look at them, and while doing so heard some one in the 
brush whisper: "Let him alone; he will go and bring 
more." He at once suspected Indians; and, without fur- 
ther examination, he hurried to Hadden's fort and reported 



46 HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

wliat lie had seen and heard. But, lie was not believed. 
There was a party of men from Greenbrier spending the 
night at the fort, and they intended to start home in the 
morning. Their road home led by this jilace where the 
tracks had been seen. When they got ready to go, a part}' 
of citizens volunteered to accompany them to this place, 
and ascertain whether there really were tracks in the mud. 

The men proceeded carelessly, and when near the sus- 
pected hiding place of the enemy, they were fired upon by 
Indians in ambuscade. The horsemen sprang into a gallop 
and escaped; but the men on foot were surrounded by In- 
dians. The only means of escape was by crossing the river 
and climbing a steep hill on the opposite side. In doing 
this they were exposed to the fire of the enemy, and several 
were killed. John McLain was almost to the summit of the 
hill when he was shot. James Rolston, wlio was still fur- 
ther, was also killed at the same instant. James Crouch 
was likewise ascending the hill, and was nearly to the top 
when he was shot. But he was only wounded, and the next 
day made his way to the fort. John Nelson, another of the 
part}', was killed at the water's edge. He had crossed the 
river with the rest, and would have ascended the hill with 
them ; but, they were a little in advance of him, and when 
they fell, he turned back, and tried to escape by running- 
down the bank of the river. But this was a fatal policy. 
A fierce Indian leaped upon him, and a desperate fight en- 
sued. No white man saw it to tell how it went. It is only 
known from circumstances that it was a hand-to-hand fight, 
and a terrible one. The breech of Nelson's gun was split 
and shattered, and from appearances he had pounded the 
Indian with it. His hands, still clinched although he was 
dead, contained tufts of Indian hair, and gave evidence that 



JOHN MINEAE. 47 

it was a prolonged fight. But the savage got off victorious, 
and Nelson was killed. When the whites visited the scene 
of the battle, they found the dead man where he fell. The 
ground around him was torn up, as though a long struggle 
had taken i)lace. It undoubtedly was a dear victory for the 
savage. 

In a fcAv days the Indians fell upon the family of John 
Gibson, on a branch of Tygart's Yalley Kiver. The family 
were at the sugar camp, when the Indians surprised them 
and took them prisoners. Mrs. Gibson was killed. 

With this, the Indians left Randolph County and pro- 
ceeded into Tucker. Of course, it is understood that these 
counties — Lewis, Upsliur, Randolph and Tuck»r — are called 
by their present names, and not by the names by which 
they were known at that time. Nor is it absolutely certain 
that all the mischief, narrated and to be yet narrated, was 
done by this band of Indians. It requires some little arbi- 
trary chronology to arrange into this order the fragments 
and scraps of history and legends gathered from various 
sources, but principally from Withers' Border Warfare. 
But, at this point. Withers' narrative ceases to furnish ma- 
terial for the account, except the mere mention of the 
killing of Sims above St. George ; and, for the rest of the 
raid, and the murder of Jonathan Miuear below St. George, 
and the captivity and rescue of Washburn, this account 
rests upon the authority of private papers and the tradi- 
tions that have come down from generation to generation. 
Unwritten tradition is one of the most unreliable sources 
from which to gather history. Yet in the absence of all 
other means, it must be resorted to. However, the follow- 
ing account of the Indian raid through Tucker has records 
for authority, and tradition furnishes little more than the 
minutia. 



48 HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

There is queston conceruiug the date of the incursiou ; 
but contemporary facts ought to settle the question, and 
place it in the spring of 1780. Some maintain that John 
Minear was killed before Jonathan was, and that the mur- 
der of the latter took ]3lace as late as 1795. But this is so 
plainly a gross mistake that it is not deemed necessar}' to 
refute it. 

It was in March, 1780 ; and the Indians, after their am- 
buscade on the Tygart River, moved over Laurel Hill and 
down Cheat River toward St. George. That had been a 
severe winter for Minear's colony. In addition to the suf- 
fering from want, the small-pox broke out among the people, 
and the affliction fell heavily upon the destitute settlers, 
who had spent the greater part of the winter without bread 
or salt. One thing was to their advantage, and that was 
that there was little to be feared from Indians during the 
winter months. The Indians seldom broke into settlements 
in cold weather when the snow was on the ground. 

So, the colony at St. George pulled through the Aviuter 
the best they could. Tlie}^ did not occupy the fort ; but 
each man lived on his own farm, and worked to clear fields 
in which to plant grain the coming summer. 

It was customary at that time to go east once a year to 
lay in a supply of such things as must be had. For the cen- 
tral part of y/est Virginia, the eastern market was Win- 
chester. The people of the frontier counties carried such 
produce as they had to that place and bartered it for salt, 
iron, ammunition and a few blacksmith and cooper tools. 
With the first appearance of spring, the colonists at St. 
George prepared to send their plunder to market. It was 
the plan to go and return before the warm weather would 
bring Indians into the settlements. The jTrincipal article 



JOHN MINEAR. 4» 

of export was the skins of bear and other fiir-bearing ani- 
mals. With a load of these strapped on pack horses, the 
settlers filed away through the woods toward Winchester. 
It was then early in March, and they expected to make the 
trip within two weeks. 

Intelligence of the Indian murders in Lewis and Upshur 
counties had reached St, George, and the people, not know- 
ing whither the enemy had gone, thought it best to leave 
their farms and move into the fort. This they did. But 
some who had the small-pox were excluded from the fort. 
This was a harsh course to pursue ; but it was rendered 
necessary. It was deemed better for a few to run the risk 
of falling a prey to Indians than for the whole colony to be 
stricken down with the small-pox. Accordingly, those who 
had that disease were not allowed to come near the fort. 
Among those thus excluded was the family of John Sims, 
who lived about five miles above St. George at a place ever 
since known as Sims' Bottom. Sims' Knob, a high moun- 
tain overlooking the Horse Shoe, is also named from this 
man.* 

When the Indians left Tygart's Valley, they aimed for 
St. George ; and, by passing along the west bank of Cheat 
River from the mouth of Pheasant Run, they had arrived 
within five miles of the fort, when they came into the clear- 
ing of Sims. The house stood on the bank of a swamp full 
of brush and weeds. The Indians made their way unob- 
served into this thicket, and were cautiously craAvliug 
toward the house when they were seen by a negro wench, 

* Sims -was brought to Cheat by Captain Parsons, and was only a tenant on Parsons' 
land. He had been placed on the farm where he was killed, to oversee the upper part 
of James Parsons' land, and to keep Thomas Parsons' cattle from crossing orer Into 
the Horse Shoe. The sycamore tree behind which the Indian lay was still to be seen 
a few years ago. 
4 



50 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

vlio ran to the door and gave the alarm. Bernard Sims 
caught up his gun and ran to the door. He was just recov- 
ering from the small-pox. As he stepped out at the door, 
he was shot by the Indians and fell forward in the yard. 
The savages leaped out from the brush and rushed into the 
yard ready to tomahawk and scalp the dead man. But as 
they came up they observed that he had a disease, to them 
most terrible; and, instead of scalping him, and killing those 
in the house, they took to flight, yelling as they ran : "Small- 
pox! Small-pox!" 

They kept clear of that cabin after that, although they 
remained in the neighborhood several days. They moved 
on toward St. George. The people . there discovered that 
the enemy was in the vicinity, and the strictest guard was 
kept night and day. Nobody left the fort under any cir- 
cumstances. 

The fort stood where the Court-house now stands, about 
two hundred yards from the river, on a rising ground. The 
Indians remained on the opposite side of the river, and 
concealed themselves on a bluff overlooking the fort and 
surroundings. Here they remained several days. There 
were not many men in the fort. Some had been kept away 
on accoimt of small-pox ; and those who had gone to Win- 
chester had not yet returned. The garrison well knew of 
the presence of the enemy, and knew jiist where the Indians 
were hidden ; yet, they aftected not to suspicion that an 
enemy Avas near. But, the greatest anxiety was felt, lest 
the Indians should make an attack while the place was so 
defenseless. The concealed foe could be descried crouch- 
ing under the thicket of laurel on the bluft' beyond the 
river ; and their number Avas probabl}' overestimated, al- 
tliou";h the actual number coiild not have been much less 



JOHN MINEAK. 51 

than fifty. The whites expected an attack any hour. If 
the attack had been made, it is doubtful if the place could 
have held out ; because the hill near by would have given 
the assailing party a great advantage. 

The garrison were desirous of impressing the Indians 
with the idea that the fort contained a strong force of men. 
To this end, they dressed first in one kind of clothes and 
then in another, at each change walking about the yard in 
full view of the foe. The Indians, who were all the time 
looking on, and not more than a quarter of a mile away, 
must have been led to believe that the fort was stronger 
than they could attack with safety. At any rate, they made 
no assault ; and, in a day or two they disapjjeared from the 
hill, and the people hoped that the foe so much dreaded 
had indeed left the country. 

However, it was deemed best to remain in the fort till the 
return of those who had gone east. This was not long. 
The men returned the next evening, and for the present 
little fear of danger was entertained. The people did not 
remain so constantly on the lookout. When they began to 
visit their cabins near about the fort, it was found that the 
Indians had rummaged them, and had. carried off what they 
could, and had destroyed much that they could not take. 
Still, nothing was seen to indicate that the enemy was yet 
in the country. 

Some of the men took their families to their cabins, de- 
termined to do a little more work before the season for In- 
dian incursions — for it was still earlier in the spring than 
the Indians were in the habit of making raids into the set- 
tlements. Among those who left the fort under the im- 
pression that the red men were gone and danger for the 
present at an end, was Daniel Cameron, who lived opposite 



52 HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

Miller Hill, on the farm since known as the Bowman Plan- 
tation, by the nearest road some three miles from St. 
George. He removed his family to his farm, and that night 
they locked the door, as was usual at that time. Awhile 
after dark, a noise was heard like the rattle of a charger 
against a powder-horn. If no danger had been feared, this 
slight incident would scarcely have been noticed. But, at 
a time of such intense anxiety, it at once aroused suspicions. 
Presently other disturbances were heard, and it became 
nearly certain that Indians were prowling about. The light 
in the house was extinguished, and the family crawled out 
at the back door, and hid in a brush heap until everything 
became quiet, when they made their way to the fort, and 
reported what had taken place. But the people were not 
disposed to credit the story, and little attention was paid 
to it. 

A day or two more passed, and nothing further was seen 
or heard of the Indians. But, all this time the treacherous 
savages were lying hid on the hill above the mouth of 
Clover Run, in a field near the present residence of Hon. 
William Ewin. They were about a mile from the fort ; but 
still in sight of it. They had abandoned the laurel thicket 
opposite the fort, because they suspected that the garrison 
had discovered them. They selected their new hiding 
place, and remained in it during the day, and at night they 
prowled about the settlement. From where they were they 
could see all that went on in and about St. George, and 
they were ready to fall upon any stray party who should go 
out. An opportunity for this soon came. 

Jonathan Minear's farm was two miles below St. George, 
on the south side of the river, just below where John Auvil, 
Esq., now lives. Jonathan Run is named from him. He 



JOHN MINEAR. 53 

selected this site at the same time that his father selected 
the one where St. George stands, and he made it his home, 
except when danger compelled him to remove to the fort 
for safety. When the Indians first came into the neighbor- 
hood, he abandoned his farm and retired to St. George, 
where he remained until he considered all danger at an end. 
But, when nothing more could be seen of the enemy, and 
nothing heard, except vague rumors, of which there always 
was sufficient, he determined to visit his farm and look 
after his cattle. His brother-in-law, Washburn, volunteered 
to go with him, and, at daylight, the two left the fort 
together and proceeded to the ford, about half fuile below- 
Here they were joined by Cameron, who was afoot, and 
was on his way to his own farm. His way was along the 
northern bank of the river, while Minear and Washburn's 
was along the southern bank. They talked a few minutes, 
and sex^arated, Minear and Washburn, on horseback, cross- 
ing the river and Cameron i)roceeding down the northern • 
bank on foot. 

The morning was clear and cold, for it was in March or 
early in April. The men on horseback passed very near 
where the Indians lay concealed, but not so near as to be 
shot. However, the savages probably learned from their 
conversation where they were going, and running on ahead, 
hid in the tall dry weeds that stood thick along the bank of 
the river in the field where the cattle were. The men rode 
leisurely on, thinking little of danger. When they got to 
the cabin they tied their horses. Washburn proceeded to 
the field to feed the cattle fodder, while Minear went to get 
corn for the hogs. With a shock of fodder on his back, 
Washburn was passing through the bars when some Indians 
sprang out of the fence corner and seized him. Immediately 



54 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

tliere was a discharge of gnns, and "Waslibiiru saw Miuear 
running toward the river, and a dozen Indians after him. 
Minear ran as tliongh Avounded, and the savages gained 
fast upon him, and overtook him on the bank of the river. 

He had been shot in the thigh, and was so disabled that 
he could not escape. When he reached the bank, he saw 
that the Indians would strike him with their tomahawks ; 
and, to avoid the blows, for him the last resort, he ran 
round a beech tree, bracing himself against the tree with 
one hand and fighting the Indians off witli the other. 

It is a cliaracteristic of the Indians that, when they chase 
a man, as they did Minear, they always run one behind 
another, and do not try to head off the object of their pur- 
suit. Thus, when they came up with Minear at the beech 
tree and he ran round it, instead of some of them turning 
back in the opposite direction to head him off, they all ran 
round the same way, round and round and round. They 
wei-e striking at him with their tomahawks, and he was try- 
ing to ward ofi:' the blows. Several times they missed him 
and struck the tree, and the marks of their tomahawks are 
to be seen on the tree to this day. Three of his fingers 
were cut off while thus defending himself. But the odds 
were too great against him, and he fell, his head cleft by a 
tomahawk. 

All this, from the first attack on Washburn till Minear 
fell dead, Avas done in a few seconds ; and, Avliile Washburn 
was standing Avith the fodder still on his back, and looking 
at the Indians Avho Avere murdering Minear, Cameron Avas 
also an eye Avitness from tlie other side of the river. Wash- 
burn, in his anxiety for his companion, forgot that himself 
Avas a prisoner ; and, not until ordered to do so l)y the In- 
dians, did he throw doAvu his fodder. But Cameron realized 



i 



JOHN MINEAE. 55 

it all at a glance, altliougli lie did not know the wliole truth. 
He saw Minear overtaken and tomahawked, and supposed 
that "Washburn was likewise killed. He had heard the dis- 
charge of guns, and concluded that by them Washburn was 
killed. Without waiting for further investigation — in fact, 
further hivestigation Avas not possible — he wheeled and ran 
with all his speed up the river toward the fort. 

But the discharge of guns had beien heard at St. George, 
and the wildest excitement prevailed. The men mounted 
their horses in hot haste and galloped off doAvn the river. 
They did not cross at the ford, but continued down the 
northern bank. This probably saved them from a bloody 
ambuscade ; for the Indians were ready for them, and 
would have cut them off' almost to a man, had they gone 
down the same path that Washburn and Minear had taken. 
But fortune favored them, and they continued down the 
northern shore. 

They had not proceeded more than half-way when they 
met Cameron, who was out of breath from running and 
could scarcely speak for excitement. He told them that 
Minear and Washburn were killed. The party halted, and 
a hasty consultation took place. If the men were already 
dead, it could avail them little to be avenged. The strength 
of the Indians was not kno^^^l ; and it was feared that they 
would immediately bear down upon the fort. Under the 
circumstances it was thought best to hurry back and put the 
place in the best possible condition for defense. This wise 
resolution was immediately carried into effect. The men 
rode back, carrying Cameron with them, and brought the 
sad intelligence to the fort. All was hurry and activity. 
There was no time for lamentations. A supply of water was 
provided, so that the inmates miglit not suffer from tliirst 



56 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

in case of a siege. Ammunition was gotten ready. Large 
quantities of bullets were molded, and all the guns were 
loaded ready for an attack any moment. 

The day passed, and no attack was made. The enemy 
had not appeared in sight. But the anxiety and dread were 
not lessened ; for it then began to be believed that the In- 
dians were probably keeping out of sight in order to throw 
the garrison oft' their guard, and that an attack would be 
made that night. No one thought of sleep. Every man was 
^^p and in arms. The fort was not defended b}^ regular 
soldiers, but depended for defense upon those who took 
shelter within its walls. When night came, and the addi- 
tional suspense and fear, that ahvays accompany darkness 
and silence, fell upon the people, they determined to put on 
a bold front, hoping that, by doing so, they could strike 
terror into the hearts of the Indians and keep them at bay- 
There was in the fort a gigantic negro named Moats. 
Him they dressed as a soldier, and had him march round 
and round the fort, within the palisades, beating a drum. 
This was to cause a belief among the Indians, should they 
be skulking near, that a large force was under arms in the 
fort-yard, and that this martial displa}' was a legitimate 
manifestation of power. This was kept up all night, and 
scarcely an eye was closed in slumber. No enemy appeared. 
Whether the display of force had alarmed the Indians, they 
did not then know. But, when the morning broke, and no 
enemy, or sign of any, was in sight, the men prepared to 
visit the scene of the tragedy of the previous day. It is 
not now known how many men were in St. George at 
that time ; but, judging from what is known on the subject, 
there must have been between twenty and thirty'. They were 



I 



JOHN MINEAR. 57 

gathered in from all the settlements for miles around, both 
above and below St. George. 

It had been a cold, frosty night. Early in the morning 
the men formed in a body and marched down the river, on 
the the north side. When they reached a point opposite 
where Minear was killed, the men ranged themselves in 
line of battle along the side of the hill, and sent Moats, 
the negro, across the river to see if the Indians were any- 
where about. The men stood ready to fire, in case the 
enemy should put in an appearance. Moats rode over, 
searched the thickets up and down the shore, and saw 
nothing to indicate that the foe was hidden anywhere 
around. Then the men crossed over, using the greatest 
caution lest they should fall into an ambuscade. They 
feared that the Indians were hidden in the weeds, and 
would wait till an advantage was presented, and then run 
out and attack the party. 

"When they got over the river they found Minear Ij'ing 
dead where he fell. The Indians had killed him by the 
beech tree, and had chopped the upper part of his heac,! off 
with their tomahawks. They then broke his skull into 
fragments and drove the pieces into a stump hard by. A 
dog that had always followed him was found guarding the 
dead man. 

Search was then made for Washburn. It was not known 
what had become of him. Cameron had not seen him ; but 
he supposed that it was at him that the guns had been 
fired. The whites explored the woods and the corn field, 
but could find no trace of him. Nor was anything seen of 
Indians. But, finally a trail was found leading up a ridge, 
since known as Indian Point, and by following it a short 
distance it was found that the Indians had retreated by 



58 HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

that way on tlie day before. It was also discovered that 
AVashburu was carried off a prisoner. His track was dis- 
tinguished from those of the Indians. The Indians did not 
always kill every one whom they canglit. Often they car- 
ried their prisoners into captivity, and sometimes they 
would take a captive with them hundreds of miles into 
their country, and then burn him or pound him to death. 
At times, prisoners were well treated ; but, it was generally 
considered that to fall a captive to the Indians was a fate 
little less to be dreaded than death. So, when it was found 
that "Washburn was taken prisoner it was considered that 
he was little more fortunate than Minear, who was killed. 

It was resolved to follow the Indians as soon as Minear 
should be buried. His dead body was taken up, bound on 
a horse and carried to the fort. He had stiffened and fro- 
zen as he fell. His arms Avere extended wide, and he was 
covered with coagulated blood. Thus he was carried to 
St. George and was buried. No one now knows where his 
grave is ; but it is believed to be under a chestnut tree 
about one half-mile east of the town. 

The next morning as many men as could be spared from 
the fort went in pursuit of the Indians. They trailed them 
a night and two days. Had the Indians immediately 
shaped their course for the Ohio River they must have es- 
caped before the whites could have overtaken them. But 
they did not do this. They seemed to be hunting for set- 
tlements about the Valley River, and b}' sjiending their 
time in this manner they allowed the pursuing party to 
come up. The Indian camp was discovered awhile after 
dark on the second night. David Minear, brother to Jona- 
than, crawled up near enough to spy out the position of the 
enemy, and to see that Washburn was indeed a prisoner 



JOHN MINEAR. 59 

■with them. It was resolved to fall on the Indians at once. 
The whole part}^ of whites cautiously aj^proached and let 
the Indians have it. A tumultuous uproar followed. The 
savages caught up what plunder they could snatch, and 
bounded away into the woods, while the whites rushed into 
the camp to take the wounded savages prisoner. Wash- 
burn was found unhurt. Two or three of the enemy were 
shot. While the whites stood round the fire in the excite- 
ment of the victory, an Indian came ramping into their 
midst, snatched up a pouch of something from the ground, 
and was ojff before the whites recovered enough from their 
surprise to capture or shoot the scoundrel. It was thought 
that the pouch contained some superstitious concoction of 
medicine. . 

After this skirmish, when it was certain that the Indians 
were gone and no more punishment could be inflicted upon 
them, the company returned to St. George. The Indians 
made their way back across the Ohio River into their own 
country. 

About the colony of St. George, aftairs went on well 
enough for some time. The people were very careful not 
to expose themselves to the Indians. Some returned to 
their farms and underwent all risks ; while others would go 
to their plantations during the day and repair to the fort at 
night. Another visit was made by the Indians about this 
time. The date is not certain, but it is believed to have 
been in 1780. A small band of Indians carried aAvay a boy 
who was at work in a field at the mouth of Clover Run, 
nearly a mile from the fort. Not much is known of this 
event ; but it is said that when the Indians took the boy 
prisoner he had with him a pet crow, and it followed him 
nearly to the Ohio River, where tlie Indians killed it, be- 



60 HISTORY OP TUCKER COUNTY. 

cause they thought it possessed of an evil spirit. It is not 
known what became of the boy. 

The year 1781 records the greatest calamity that ever be- 
fell the St. George colony. It was the murder by Indians 
of Daniel Cameron, Mr. Cooper and John Minear. They 
w^ere the three foremost men of the settlement. John Mi- 
near had planned and founded the colony ; and to him more 
than to any one else was its prosperity due. He was killed 
in April, 1781. 

The band of Indians, by whom the murder was commit- 
ted, made a raid very similar to that of the gang that killed 
Jonathan Minear. Nearly the same territory was overrun 
and nearly the extent of wickedness done. The savages 
first appeared in Lewis County, on the head of Stone Coal 
Creek, where they waylaid three men named Schoolcraft, 
who had gone there from Buckhannon for the purpose of 
hunting pigeons. The Indian shot at them and killed one. 
The two others were taken prisoner, and it is not certain 
that they were ever again heard of. But it was believed 
that they joined the Indians, and afterwards guided parties 
of the savages through the settlements and helped them kill 
white people. These were the last of the Schoolcraft fam- 
ily. Fifteen of them had been killed or carried into cap- 
tivity within the space of seven years. Their fate and that 
of the Minears seemed connected. It is thought that the 
party that killed Jonathan Minear also killed Austin School- 
craft and took prisoner his niece. Then, the band by M'hich 
John Minear was killed, the next year, killed and captured 
three Schoolcrafts, making five in all that fell by the hands 
that slew the Minears. 

After this depredation in Lewis County, the Indians 
passed over to the Valley River, in Barbour County ; and a 



I 



JOHN MINEAE. 61 

few miles below Philippi they set themselves in ambush at 
a narrow place in the road. 

About this time commissioners had been appointed to 
adjust land claims in this part of the State, and to execute 
the necessary legal papers to those who had complied with 
the law in pre-empting the public Iknds. The commissioners 
met at Clarksburg. Land claimants went there from all 
neighboring parts to present claims for consideration. The 
people of St. George, in common with those of other settle- 
ments, sent their agents to Clarksburg to attend to the 
business and to obtain deeds for the various tracts of land 
claimed by the different settlers. Those whom St. George 
sent were John Minear, Daniel Cameron, two men named 
Miller, Mr. Cooper and Mr. Goffe. They had proceeded to 
Clarksburg, attended to their business, and were on their 
way home at the time the Indians were lying in their am- 
buscade below Philippi. It seems from the circumstances 
that the Indians were looking for them. 

The Indians placed themselves in a position commanding 
the road, and hung a leather gun-case by a string over the 
path. This was to attract attention, cause a halt and give 
the savages an opportunity to take deliberate aim. The 
trap was well set, and the men came riding along the path, 
thinking nothing of danger. The path was so narrow that 
they could ride only in single file. They were almost under 
the leather decoy before they saw it. They instantly 
brought their horses to a halt. The truth flashed into 
Minear's mind, and quickly wheeling his horse, he exclaimed 
"Indians!" The whole party would have wheeled; but, 
instantly a discharge of guns from the hidden foe threw 
them into the wildest confusion. Horses and men fell 
together. Minear, Cameron and Cooper were killed on the 



62 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

spot. Goft'e and one of the Millers sprang from their 
horses and took to the woods. The other Miller was not 
unhorsed. He wheeled back, and fled toward Clarksburg. 
The savages tried hard to catch him ; but his horse was 
fleeter than they, and he made good his flight to Clarksburg. 

Miller sought to escape by ascending the hill. He was 
on foot, and two or three Indians started in pursuit, armed 
only with knives and tomahawks. He had the start of them 
by less than twenty yards, and they seemed confident of 
overhauling him. Indeed, he had little hope of escaping ; 
but he considered it better to make an eflbrt for his life. 
His pursuers, close upon his heels, called continually to him 
to stop, and told him if he did not, they would most cer- 
tainly kill liim. They accompanied their threats by the 
most violent gesticulations. Had they exerted all their en- 
ergy in the pursuit and done less yelling, they might have 
sooner terminated the chase. As it was. Miller did not stop 
in compliance with their demand, although he almost de- 
spaired of being able to get away. The hill was steep, and 
his strength was nearly gone; but he struggled upward, 
reached the summit, turned down the other side, and was 
out of sight of the savages. But the chase was not done. 
The Indians folloAved fast after him, and he ran through 
the tangled brush, dodged to left and, right, and finall}- 
avoided them. He knew not but that he was the onl}' one 
who had escaped. He had seen the others fall, and thought 
them killed. But it was not entirely so. 

"While Miller ^vas thus getting away from his pursuers by 
a long and desperate race, Gofl'e was making a still more 
wonderful escape. AVhen he leaped from his horse, instead 
of going up the hill, as Miller had done, he broke through 
the line of foes and ran for the river. A score of the sav- 



JOHN MINEAE. 63 

ages started in pursuit, as confident of a speedy capture as 
those had been who followed Miller. But, in spite of their 
efforts to catch him, Goffe kept his distance. He looked 
back as he reached the river bank, and no Indians were in 
sight. He threw off his coat to swim, and leaped down the 
bank. But at that instant he heard his pursuers tearing 
through the brush almost immediately above him. He saw 
that it was impossible to escape by swimming ; and, on the 
impulse of the moment, he pitched his coat in the water, 
and crept for concealment into an otter den which happened 
to be at hand. 

By this time the Indians had reached the bank above him. 
He could hear them talking ; and he learned from their 
conversation that they thought he had dived. They 
expected to see him rise from the water. He could see their 
images mirrored from the water of the river under him. He 
could see the glittering and glistening of their tomahawks 
and knives in the sunlight. His den was barely large enough 
to conceal him ; and his tracks in the mud would lead to his 
hiding place. He prepared to plunge into the water and 
take his chances of escape by diving. But the Indians had 
caught sight of the coat as it was floating down the river ; 
and they began to move oft' to keep pace with it. They 
supposed that Goft'e was either drowned or had made his 
escape. They abandoned the man for the moment and 
turned their attention to saving the coat. How they suc- 
ceeded in this is not known ; for Goffe did not wait to see 
the termination of the affair. He crawled from his den and 
made off, leaving them a hundred yards below. He started 
directly for St. George, which he reached that night. 

Severe as this blow was to the Cheat Eiver settlement, it 
was probably lighter than it would have been, had not the 



64 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

attack been made on the party of land claimants. Tliis 
band of Indians were heading for St. George ; but, when 
Goflfe and the Millers escaped, it was not deemed advisable 
to proceed, since the place could not be taken by suiimse. 
Therefore, the Indians turned back up the Valley River to 
Tygart's Valley, where they fell upon settlements unpre- 
pared for them. 

Leading Creek, in Randolph County, was then a flourish- 
ing colon3\ The people had heard of the presence of 
Indians in the more western counties, and were busily mov- 
ing into the fort. While thus engaged, the savages fell 
upon them and nearl}^ destroyed the whole settlement. 
Among those killed were Alexander Roney, two women, 
Mrs. Daugherty and Mrs. Hornbeck, and a family of chil- 
dren. They also took several prisoners, among whom were 
Mrs. Roney and Daniel Daugherty. Others of the settle- 
ment made their escape, and carried the neAvs to Friend's 
fort. A company of men at once collected to hunt down 
the Indians and kill them. Col. AVilson led the pursuing 
party. "When they reached Leading Creek they found the 
settlement broken up, the people gone and nearly all the 
houses and barns burned to the ground. The trail of the 
Indians was soon found, and a swift pursuit was made. 
The savages turned westward, and seemed to be aiming for 
the AVest Fork River. Colonel Wilson's party continued 
upon their track for some time, and until the men began to 
gi'ow fearful that other Indians might fall upon the Tygart's 
Valley settlements, while thus deprived of so many of its 
men. Some wanted to go back, and only a few were very 
anxious to continue the pursuit of the Indians. A vote was 
taken to decide whether or not the party should proceed. 
Only four. Colonel Wilson, Richard Kittle, Alexander AYest 



JOHN MINEAR. 



65 



and Joseph Friend, voted to go on. Consequently, the 
whole party turned back. 

But, the savages were not to escape thus. The settle- 
ments on the West Fork, about and above Clarksburg, were 
on the lookout for the marauders. Miller, who escaped 
when Minear, Cooper and Cameron were killed, had fled to 
Clarksburg, and had alarmed the country so that a close 
lookout was kept. Spies and scouts traversed the country 
looking for the enemy. At length, one of the spies discov- 
ered the Indians on West Fork, and Colonel William 
Lowther-' collected a party of men and hurried to attack 
them. When he got to the place where the Indians had 
been seen, near the mouth of Isaac's Creek, they were gone. 
He followed after them, and overtook them on Indian. 
a branch of Hughes' River, in D^tlrtrulge County. He came 
in sight of them awhile before night. It was thought best 
to wait till morning before making the attack. Accordingly, 
Elias and Jesse Hughes were left to watch the enemy, while 
Colonel Lowther led his men back a short distance to rest 
and get ready to fall upon the Indians at daj'break in the 
morning. Nothing of note occurred that night. The In- 
dians did not discover their pursuers. 

When the twittering of the birds announced that day 
was at hand, the whites began to prepare for the fight. 
The}' craAvled forward as noiselessly as panthers, and lay 
close around the camp of the enem}-. As soon as it was 
light enough to take aim, a general fire was poured into the 
midst of the savage encampment. Five fell dead. The 
others leaped up and yelled and darted off into the woods, 
leaving all their ammunition, plunder and all their guns, but 
one, in the camp. The whites rushed forward to beat down 

• Colonel William Lowther was a relative of Rev. O. Lowther, well known In Tucker 
County. 







GG HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

tliose who were trying to get away. It was then found that 
one of the whites, who had been taken prisoner in Tygart's 
Yalley and was in the Indian camp, was killed. He had 
been shot by the Avhites who made the attack. They had 
been very careful to guard against such an occurrence. 
From the prisoners who were retaken, it was learned that 
a large baud of Indians were near, and were expected to 
come up soon. On account of this. Colonel Lowther 
thought it best not to follow the fugitive Indians. He 
buried the prisoner whom his men had accidentally killed, 
and, with the guns and plunder of the enemy, he returned to 
the settlements, well satisfied that the Indians had not got- 
ten off without something of merited punishment. The fol- 
lowing account of the affair is from Withers' Border War- 
fare : 

As soon as the fire was opened upon the Indians, Mrs. lioney 
(one of the prisoners) ran toward tlie wliites rejoicinj? at the pros- 
pect of dehverance, and exclaiming : "I am Elhck Roney's wife. 
of the Valley, I am Ellick Roney's wife, of the Valley, and a pretty 
little woman, too, if I Avas well dressed.'* The poor woman, igno- 
i-ant of the fact that her son was Aveltering in his gore, and forget- 
ting for an instant that her husband had been so recently killed, 
seemed intent only on her own deliverance from the savage captors. 

Another of the captives, Daniel Daugherty, being tied down and 
unable to move, was discovered by the Avhites as they rnshed 
towards the camp. Fearing that he might be one of the enemy 
and do them some injury if they advanced, one of the men, stop- 
ping, demanded who he was. Benumbed by the cold and 
discomposed by the sudden iiring of the whites, he could not 
render his Irish dialect intelligible to them. The white man raised 
his gun and directed it toward him, calling aloud, that if he did 
not make known who he was, he should blow a ball through him, 
let him be white man or Indian. Fear supplying him with en ergy, 
Daugherty exclaimed : "Lord Jasus ! and am I to be killed by 
white paple at last ?" He was heard by Colonel Wilwmi - and his 
life saved. /y . 



JOHN MINEAK. 67 

When the news of the massacre of Minear and his com- 
panions reached St. George, the excitement was little less 
than it had been when Jonathan Minear had been killed. 
The danger in the former case was more imminent than in 
the latter. But, the blow was heavier, and was more sen- 
sibly felt. The loss of John Minear, in particular, was 
irreparable. He was the central mind of the colony, and 
to him all looked for advice. It was on account of his su- 
perior business qualifications that he was sent to Clarks- 
burg to attend to securing deeds for the lands. 

As soon as it was known at St. George that he was killed, 

the settlers from the surrounding country collected and 

proceeded to the Valley Eiver to bury the dead. The way 

thither was not free from danger. It was not then known 

where the Indians had gone, or whether they had gone. 

The settlers moved with the extremest caution, lest they 

should fall into an ambuscade. But, of course, there was 

no real danger of this, because the Indians were by that 

time on Leading Creek, in Randolph County. When the 

scene of the tragedy was reached, Minear, Cooper and 

Cameron were found dead where the};- fell. It was not a 

time for unnecessary display at the funeral. It was not 

known at what moment the Indians would be down upon 

them, and the funeral was as hasty and noiseless as possible. 

A shallow grave was dug on the spot, and the three men 

were consigned to it. 

We carved not a line and we raised not a stone, 
But we left him alone in his glory. 

Not many years ago a party of road-workers accidentally 
exhumed the bones of the men. A very old man was pres- 
ent. He had been personally acquainted with them and 
identified them by their teeth. Two of Minear's front teetli 



68 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

were missing at the time of his death. So were they in one 
of the skulls. Cameron used tobacco, and his teeth being 
worn, it was easy to tell which skull belonged to him. A 
peculiarity of teeth also distinguished Cooper. The bones 
were re-interred near by in a better grave. ■■'■ 

This was the last time the Indians ever invaded Tucker 
County, so far as is now known. The war against the In- 
dians in this part lasted only about seven years, from 1774 
to 1781. It raged nearly fifteen years longer about Clarks- 
burg, Wheeling, and along the Ohio. But St. George was 
too far removed from the frontier to be open to attacks from 
the Indians. 

* Conquest of tlie Ohio Valley, by Hii Maxwell. 



CHAPTER III. 
MISCELLANIES. 

The dwelling-liouses of the first settlers of Tucker County 
diifered somewhat from those of the present day. The 
liardy pioneers pushed into the wilderness with little of 
this world's goods. But, they possessed that greatest of 
fortunes, health, strength and honesty. They were poor; 
but the Czars of Russia or the Chams of Tartar^', in their 
crystal palaces, were not richer. In that time, manners 
were not as they are now. Necessities were plentiful and 
luxuries were unknown, except such luxuries as nature 
bestowed gratuitously upon them. 

To better their conditions, the people who came to 
Tucker had sold or left what possessions they may have had 
in the more thickly settled communities, and had plunged 
boldly into the wilderness to claim the rich gifts which an 
all-bountiful nature was offering to those who would reach 
forth their hands and take. Besides, there was something 
in the wild, free, unfettered life of the forest that was allur- 
ing to the restless spirits that breathed liberty from the 
air about them. The ties of society and the comforts of 
opulence were willingly exchanged for it. 

The appearance and condition of the county when first 
visited by white men has been told in the first chapter. It 
was an unbroken forest. When those back-woodsmen left 
their homes in the more eastern settlements for Tucker, 
they did not have any roads over which to travel, nor any 
carts and wagons to haul their things on. They loaded 



70 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

their plunder on pack-horses. They had not a great 
variety of wares to move. A few wooden or pewter utensils, 
a kettle, a jug or two, and a bottle, a scanty outfit of car- 
penter and cooper tools, and a little homespun clothing 
formed about all that the emigrant of that day carried with 
him, as he followed the star of empire westward. If he 
had a cow or two, and a calf, they were driven along before 
the pack-horses, and cropped Aveeds and leaves from the 
woods for a living during the journe}'. Indeed, the cattle 
lived upon this kind of feed principally for twenty-five 
years after reaching Cheat River. If the emigrant had 
children, and there usually were six or eight, they were got- 
ten along in the best available manner. If one was quite 
small, its mother carried it in her arms ; if a size larger, it 
with its older brother was placed on a pack-horse. Some- 
times two baskets, tied together like saddle-pockets, were 
slung across the horse's bony back. Then a child was 
stowed away in each bi^.sket, so they would balance. Bed- 
clothes, iron-kettles, dough-trays and other household 
articles were stuffed around the edges to hold the little 
urchins steady. Thus loaded with packs and plunder, the 
procession moved on, the larger children taking it afoot to 
drive the cattle, lead the horses and make themselves useful 
generally. The road, if any at all, was narrow and rough ; 
and the horses frecpiently scraped their loads off against 
overhanging trees; or perchance they lost their footing 
among the steep rocks, and fell floundering to the ground. 
In either case their loads of plunder, kettles, children and 
all went rolling, tumbling, rattling and laughing into the 
woods, creating a scene of ludicrous merriment. 

At night, when it was necessary to lialt, the horses were 
unloaded and turned loose to crop a supper in the woods, 



MISCELLANIES. ' 71 

first having had bells put on them by which they might be 
found should they stroll away. Then with flint and steel 
a fire was kindled, and the movers fell to cooking their 
evening meal, consisting of bear's meat, venison and corn 
bread, if any bread at all. The meat was roasted on coals, 
or on a stick held to the fire. The bread was usually baked 
in an oven or skillet, which invariably had a piece broken 
out of it.* The wheaten bread was often baked in the ashes, 
and is said to have been excellent. The beds of that time, 
while traveling, were blankets and bear skins spread on the 
ground. They slept without a shelter, unless it threatened 
to rain. In that case, a rude shed was built of bark. In 
the morning bright and early they were up and on their 
way rejoicing, singing, laughing, joking and making their 
pilgrimage glad and merry as they went. 

When they arrived at their place of destination, their 
first care was to build a house. This was done with the 
material at hand. The head of the famil}^ with two or 
three of his oldest boys, some of the neighbors, if any, 
with sharp axes and willing hands, went into the work. 
Logs were cut from twelve to twenty-fiA^e feet long. Some- 
times the logs were hewn, but generally not. The ends 
were notched to fit one upon another ; and the house was 
commonly one story high, but sometimes two, with a regular 
upstairs. The roof was of shingles four or five feet long, 
split from oak or chestnut, and unshaved.^ They were called 
clapboards. They were laid upon the lath and rafters so 
as to be water tight, and were held to their place by logs 
thrown across them. No nails were used. 

It was the custom at that time to build the chimneys on 
the inside of the house. While the house was building, an 

* Flnley. 



72 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

extra log was thrown across some six feet from the ground, 
and three feet from the end of the house. From this log to 
the roof, the flue was of sticks and mortar. The fire was 
directly beneath, and the smoke and sparks thus escaped 
through the wide opening of the chimney. "Wood ten feet 
long could 1)6 thrown on the tire, and, when burnt off in 
the middle, the pieces were shoved together. The floors 
were of thick, rough wooden slabs; or often the ground 
w^as the floor. James Gofl*, although one of the richest men 
in the county, had a house with a ground floor. There were 
no Aviudows. Small apertures through the wall served the 
double purpose of letting in the light and furnishing means 
of shooting at Indians when they should come near. There 
was seldom more than one door. It was made of heavy 
upright slabs, held together by transverse pieces. The 
whole was so thick that it was bullet-proof, or nearly so. 
In times of danger, it was secured by stout bars, fastened 
to the wall by iron staples on either side. The furniture of 
these normal dAvellings was simple and suflicient. The beds 
were made of skins from forest animals, or of ticks filled 
with grass or straw. The bedsteads were rude frames, con- 
sisting of forks driven into the ground and poles laid 
across ; or the bedding was on the ground or floor. An 
iron ]iot, the broken oven, a few wooden or pewter plates 
and cups, half dozen stools, a rough slab on pegs for a 
table, a shelf in the corner for a cupboard and pantry, and 
the furnitiire was complete. 

When the first people came to Tucker, they had not the 
means of procuring fine clothes, and in consequence, their 
raiment was just such as they coiild get the easiest. Boots 
Avere not to be had, and the}- wore moccasins. Their under- 
clothing was of linen, at times of calico. Their outer gar- 



MISCELLANIES. 73 

ments were of liusey or of leather. The men nearly always 
wore leather breeches, and coats called hunting shirts. 
These coats were in fashion like the blue overcoats worn by 
the Union soldiers during the war. The edges and facing 
were decorated with a fringe, made by cutting the border 
into fine strings, leaving them hanging fast to the coat. 
They were frequently stained red, blue or some other color. 
A row of similar fringes extended from the top to the bot- 
tom of each leggin. The fastenings were either leather 
strings or big leaden buttons of home manufacture. 

The moccasins were like those worn by the Indians, cut 
in one piece and closed by a seam on top. They liad long 
flaps to the top, which were wound about the upper foot 
and ankle to keep out the briers of summer and the snow of 
winter. Those moccasins were a poor protection to the 
feet in wet weather. They were made of deer skin, and 
were flimsy and porous. In wet weather the feet of the 
w-earer were constantly soaked. From that cause, the 
early settlers were subject to rheumatism, which was about 
their only disease. To dry their feet at night was their 
first care. Their moccasins were often decorated with 
fringes to match their other clothing. Stockings were sel- 
dom worn in the earliest times. Frequently, as a substi- 
tute for stockings, leaves were stuffed in the moccasins. 

In winter, the people wore gloves, made of dressed deer 
skin, and decorated with a fringe of mink or weasel fur. In 
summer, no gloves were worn. The head-gear was a fur 
cap, made from the skin of a raccoon, otter or fox, Avith the 
hair-side out. The tail of a fox hung behind like a tassel. 

The women dressed then as now, with the exception of a 
few bales of ribbon, a dozen hanks of superfluous lace, a 
yard of bonnet, and some other paraphernalia, best left un- 



74 HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

mentioned. But, instead of alpaca and tlie finer cloths, 
the texture of their dresses was deer skin. Their other 
raiment was also deer skin, but sometimes rough woolen 
cloth, or tow linen, or at rare times cotton, was made a sub- 
stitute. The children dressed as their parents. The men 
cropped their hair and shaved their beard about three times 
a year. 

It might be asked what the early settlers in Tucker 
could find to eat before anything was raised. They were 
not here long before tlie}^ raised enough corn for bread, and 
some potatoes, cabbage and other vegetables. They had 
an easier time than many of the other colonies in West 
Virginia. A mill was built at St. George in 1776." This 
provided a means of getting the corn ground, and was an 
advantage not enjoyed by many early settlers. Often at 
that time the people had to go thirty or forty miles through 
the woods to mill; and, as this was such a hard under- 
taking, many preferred to do without bread, and eat hominy. 
Hominy was made by pounding corn just enough to mash 
the hulls off. Or, it was soaked in lye for the same purpose. 
Then it was cooked and eaten. 

The settlers frequently ran short of bread. In that case 
they lived on meat. Fortunately, meat was alwaj's plenti- 



■» There was long a question as to where the mill stood. An old work, having the 
appearance of a mill-race, passes through the school-house lot In the town, and it 
was said that the mill was just below where the school-house stands. But this was 
disputed, and what was said hy some to be an old mill-race, was claimed by otliers to 
be only an ancient channel of the creelc. Thus the matter was unsettled lor seventy- 
flve years, and was well nigh forgotten. But, in isrs, a tremendous tlood came down 
Mill Run and cleaned out a great bar of gravel that had accumulated in tlie creek 
ford. When the water had subsided, the timbers of the old dam were laid open to 
view. The gravel had been washed off of them. Tills settled the question tliat the 
trench through the school-house lot was indeed the mill-race. Tlie old timbers of the 
dam are still to be seen protruding from the gravel on the east side of the creek. One 
hundred and eight years have had but little intluence In causing them to decay, and 
they seem as solid, and the ax-marks are as plainly to be seen as when they had been 
there only a year or two. They are white oak, hewn sfjuare, and may be seen wliere 
the road leaves the water and passes up the eastern bank of Mill Uun. 



MISCELLANIES. 75 

ful, and miglit be liad for the trouble of killing. Bear meat 
and venison were the chief dependence. It is a common 
saying among old people that the flesh of the bear was 
the bread, and venison was the meat. The venison 
was often cut into slices and dried. It would then keep 
well several months. Buffaloes were found in the earliest 
years of the St. George colony. But, they never were as 
plentiful as they were along the Ohio River, and about 
Charleston, Clarksburg and Buckhannon. Smaller game, 
such as raccoons, rabbits, pheasants and turkeys were, of 
course, plentiful. Salt was not often to be had, and it was 
thought no hardship to do without it. It cost a dollar a 
peck, and had to be carried seventy-five or one hundred 
miles. Besides, the dollar was not always at hand. Coffee 
and tea were unknown. "Whiskey and brandy were in 
nearly every house. 

Much is said of the quantities of intoxicating liquors that 
were drunk in early times, and of the scarcity of drunkards. 
This is a good subject for theories and speculations that 
would be out of place in a county history. Besides, 
Tucker County is not and never was a land of drunkards. 
Many of the people, let it be said to their praise and honor, 
have littlp idea of what a whiskey saloon is. The climate, 
habits and surroundings of the people are not such as pro- 
duce drunkards. They work too hard, there are too few 
places for idle men to associate together. 

It is hard to point out any particular harm in whiskey as 
long as it is used in its right place ; although it is equally 
hard to tell what good there is in it. In early days, when 
whiskey and brandy were in every house, men seldom got 
drunk, because they always had their liquor at hand, and 



76 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

there was no excitement or novelty to lead them to excess, 
in which alone there is harm. 

If half the creeks and springs of the county flowed aj^ple 
brandy instead of water, they could not do the harm of 
twenty grog shops scattered over the county. It is not the 
taste of the liquor that so much intices men as it is the 
debauched pleasure which they feel in co-mingling T\itli 
idlers. A man hardly ever gets drunk at home. The most 
efiectual means of redeeming drunkards is to induce them 
to stay at home, and away from the places where men 
associate only with men. But, of this there is little need in 
Tucker County. Although it is one of the smallest in West 
Yirginia, it is yet the most temperate. No county can 
claim pre-eminence in that respect over Tucker County. 

It may not be amiss to say something of the arms used 
by the early colonists on Cheat River. The main depend- 
ence was the rifle. It was the surest means of defense and 
the most usefid weapon. It furnished the settler with game 
and was a guard against the Indians. The rifle was a flint- 
lock, muzzle-loader. In addition to the rifle, a tomahawk 
and a knife Avere usually carried. These were about all the 
implements of war used in the early settlement of the 
country. Pistols were seldom used. The Indians used the 
same kind of arms that the white people used. But an In- 
dian could not shoot as well, because Indians can not do 
anything as well as a white man can. They could not keep 
their guns in order, and they did not even have skill enough 
to take their guns apart and clean them properly. 

During the first years of the county, there were no 
churches. Religious meetings were held in private houses. 
Once in a while, a minister visited the settlements and held 
a meeting; but, such meetings were not frequent. The 



MISCELLANIES. 77 

usual order was for some pious man to be chosen as class- 
leader ; and all the other people who pretended to be 
religious would join in the exercise and help. Such meet- 
ings were generally held in each settlement once a month. 
The settlers, for ten miles on every side, would come 
together with devotional zeal, and sing and pray and exhort 
each other to live and work faithfully in the cause of the 
church, and against wickedness and sin. 

No wagons or carriages were used. The people, who 
went to church, either rode on horseback or walked. They 
oftenest walked. Early on Sunday morning, especially in 
the spring and summer, the people from the forest cabins 
might be seen wending their wa}^ along the narrow roads 
toward the place appointed for the service. If the weather 
was fine, they went on foot. If they went on foot, they 
generally walked barefooted, carrying their moccasins in 
their hands. This was because they did not want to wear 
their shoes out with so much walking. A few ten-mile 
trips would put through a pair of moccasins ; while the 
barefeet were not at all injured by the walk. No doubt, 
the pioneers enjoyed their Sunday pilgrimage to church. 
Young men and young lasses, who went the same road, 
found each other's company as agreeable then as young 
folks do now. They passed the time talking and singing 
until they came in sight of the meeting-house, when they 
stopped to put on their shoes. 

The religious exercises of that day would look ridiculous 
to a city church member of the present time. But, "the 
groves were God's first temples," as it is said ; and, before 
all temples, He doth "prefer the upright heart and pure," 
as Milton believed. So we must not judge others, nor pre- 
scribe forms and bounds for the manifestation of sacred 



78 HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

devotion ; yet we may believe that, before Him wlio know- 
etli tlie secrets of all hearts, and who rewarded not him 
who prayed aloud in the synagogue for form's sake, the 
rude pioneers, in their sincerity and simplicity, were as ac- 
ceptable as those are who kneel on velvet cushions and read 
prayers from Latin books. At an}^ rate, we are not to rid- 
icule the unlettered pioneers of the last centmy. They 
worshiped as they thought best, and as best they could. 
The rude log hut, where a dozen were met together to wor- 
ship God according to the dictates of their conscience, was 
as sacred before Him as is St. Paul's or St. Peter's. H not, 
then religion is a fraud. 

There Avere no schools in the earliest years of Tucker 
Count}'. But as soon as the people were firmly settled, and 
could take their minds, for a moment, from the struggle for 
existence, the subject of education began to be agitated. 
At that time and in the remote frontiers, there was no pub- 
lic money for school purposes. Such schools as could be 
had were paid for from private pockets. The teachers, as 
might be supposed, were qualified to teach only the easiest 
branches. Arithmetic to decimal fractions, the spelling- 
book, the Testament for a reader, and the course of study 
was complete. No grammar, geography, or history was 
thought of. The teachers could not instruct in such diffi- 
cult branches. The majority of the schoolmasters of that 
time did not believe that the earth was round. Tlie}^ usu- 
ally taught writing. They set copies for the pupils to 
follow. They had no system of penmanship. When an 
apt scholar learned to write as well as the teacher, he was 
regarded perfect. However, this was seldom the case. The 
people held a schoolmaster in such esteem that they cou- 



MISCELLANIES. 79 

sidered it next to impossible for pupils to learn to write as 
well as lie ; and there was always room for a little more im- 
provement. This manner of learning to write would be 
regarded somewhat antediluvian were it to be revived now ; 
but the truth cannot be denied that those who were in- 
structed in penmanship by following written copies wrote as 
well as those do now, who spend five years on Spencer's, 
Scribner's and the Eclectic printed plates. 

Educational science has made wonderful strides forward 
during the last liunderd. years ; and it is probable that no 
department of it will ever go back to what it was then. 
But, in a few particulars, the systems of the present day 
fail where those of earlier times succeeded. If the school 
children of to-day should attend school no more months 
than they did one hundred years ago, and receive the man- 
ner of instruction that they now get, at the end of their 
school life they would not be as well prepared for business 
as those of that time were. Of course, in a general sense, 
the educational systejns of to-day are in advance of those 
one hundred years ago ; but, in the particular subjects of 
writing, reading and spelling, the old plan accomplished the 
most in a limited time. The child of the present time goes 
to school nearly ten times as much as those did of a century 
ago; yet, is the child of to-daj^ ten times as vrell educated? 
The great contention among modern educators is to find the 
natural method of imparting instruction. When one looks 
at the A. B. C. charts, costing ten or twenty dollars, over 
which the child pores for four or five months, varying the 
exercise by drawing pictures of boxes, flower-pots, bugs and 
birds, and similar tomfoolery, it is almost time to stop to 
ask if it is not possible to lose sight altogether of the so- 
called natural method of imparting instruction, and wander 



80 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

off with those who spend their time and talents in telling or 
listening to something ncAv. 

The child probably learns as much by the time it is three 
years old — that is, learns as many things — as it does during 
any ten years of its after life. It has learned everything 
that it knows at three. It has learned to talk one language, 
and knows by sight several thousand things, and by name 
several hundred. All this was taught it by natural methods ; 
because it was too young for artificial plans to be employed. 
But, from that time on, its education is more and more ar- 
tificial, and is less and less rapidly acquired. Old theories, 
customs and plans must give way to the new, and it is right 
that it should be so ; but it is meet that the new should be 
so constructed as to include all the good that there was in 
the old and something beside. 

In early times, above and below St. George, the young 
people were accustomed to meet together on Sundaj's and 
have singing-school. The exercise had something of a re- 
ligious nature, inasmuch as none but sacred songs were 
sung. It might be comj^ared to a Sunday-school, except 
that no instruction in the Testament or catedliism was 
given. The young folks met for the purpose of having a 
moral and social time, injurious to none, and pleasant to all. 
Much of these societies is remembered b}- the oldest inhab- 
itants of the coimty; and, from all accounts, the exercises 
must have exerted a good influence over the community. 
Indeed, the singing-school is not yet a thing of the past, 
although it has changed some, probably for the better. 

Incidentally connected with the singing-schools, about 
the commencement of the present century, there was a ro- 
mance that at the time Avas the subject of much talk along 
the river, and in all parts of the county. It also gives us 



MISCELLANIES. 81 

an idea of tlie spirit of the time, and how the peoj^le then 
compare Avith those of the present time. 

It seems that Manassa Miuear, son of David Minear, and 
brother to Enoch Minear, of St. George, and to Mrs. Dr. 
Bonnifield, of Horse Shoe Run, had formed an attachment 
for Miss Lyda Holbert, a beautiful girl, who lived on the 
bank of Holbert Run, four miles east of St. George. A 
match between the young people was in no manner objec- 
tionable to the Minears, only that Manassa was so young. 
He was but eighteen; and Miss Holbert was sixteen. 

Manassa fell into the habit of visiting his affianced rather 
oftener than his father thought necessary ; and, the result 
Avas a rumpus in the Minear family, and Manassa was told 
to go a little less frequently. This did not discourage the 
young man in the least. The next Sunday there was sing- 
ing-school in the Horse Shoe, and all the youngsters for 
miles around Avent as usual. Manassa and Lyda Avere there, 
and betAveen them they made it up that he Avas to accom- 
pan}' her home. His brothers and sisters tried hard to 
persuade him not to go, as the old gentleman Avould cer- 
tainly grumble. But, Manassa said, let him grumble, and 
Avent ahead. Lyda also said, let him grumble, and they 
two went off together, in company Avith the other young 
people Avho Avent that Avay. But, the rest of the Minears 
returned to St. George and reported Avhat had taken place. 
Mr. Minear Avas much put out of humor, and after studying 
over the matter two or three hours, lie decided to go in 
person and settle the matter. 

Manassa and Lyda enjoyed the fine Avalk from the Horse 
Shoe to Holbert Piun, about two miles. Thej had crossed 
the river at the AVilloAv Point in a canoe ; and, thence home, 
the path Avas a pleasant one. It lay across the Avide bottom 



82 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

from tlie river to Lo^v G.-i}), then nil woods ; and from tlie 
Low Gap home was aboiit a mile, and this, too, was nearly 
all woods. No doubt, the walk of two miles on that line 
June morning was a short one to them. 

Tradition does not inform us how the day, from noon till 
evening was passed at the Holbert cabin ; but circumstan- 
ces justify us in supposing that all went merry and well. 
It could not have been otherwise ; for, Manassa and Lyda 
could not quarrel, and the old folks were glad to have Ma- 
nassa visit their daughter, for he belonged to one of the first 
families of the county and was, indeed, a promising young- 
man. Be this as it may, he was there yet when the sun was 
just sinking behind Jonathan Point. He and Lyda w^ere 
sitting alone in the yard, under a young Avalnut tree. The 
dead frame of this tree still stands, although it is a big one 
now, It might still l)e living Ijut for a slight accident that 
happened it some seventeen years ago. Two boys, Henry 
IBonnifield, now of California, and AVilson Maxwell, of St. 
George, both little fellows then, tried to catch a red squir- 
rel that Avas on the f-mce by the tree. Wilson had a hoe 
handle (they had been hoeing corn in a field hard by) and 
was trj'ing his Ijest to knock the squirrel as high as the 
Pyramids of Egypt. But, Avhile going through gestures, 
and swinging the hoe-handle to give it all the force possi- 
ble, he skinned his knuckles on the old walnut tree. This 
made him mad, and with an ax, which lay near, he dead- 
ened the tree, and it died. The S(|uirrel, in the meantime, 
got away. 

The sun was just setting; and, no doubt, the world looked 
beautiful to Manassa and Lyda as they sat under that lit- 
tle w^alnut tree, with none near enough to hear what they 
might say. The whole day had been ]ileasant; and, now so 



MISCELLANIES. 83 

fair an evening to terminate all, was truly deliglitfuL Bnt> 
it was not to be so. The evening wliich now looked so 
beautiful to tlie 3'oung couple, soon appeared to them the 
ugliest they had ever seen. For, presently foot steps were- 
heard approaching, and when Manassa and Lyda looked up 
they saw the massive frame of David Minear coming up. 
Manassa's heart sank within him ; for, he knew what was at 
hand. Lyda also looked scared. But, they said not a 
word, and the old gentleman walked boldly up and com- 
menced flourishing a hickory withe, and uttered words to 
the effect that he wanted the young man home early enough 
Monday morning to go to hoeing potatoes when the other 
boys did. Manassa making no movement toward starting, 
the old gentleman with still more emphasis ordered him to 
"skedaddle for home." He realized his situation ; and 
casting toward Lyda one look, which seemed to sa}', good- 
bye, for the present, and receiving one of sympathy from 
her, he bounded off down the hill, with the old gentleman at 
his heels wolloping him with the withe every jump. Poor 
Lyda felt for Manassa, but she could not reach him. She 
saw him dodging this way and that way to escape the 
thrashing, and saw him bound with extra buoyancy when- 
ever an extra swoop fell upon his shoulders. She also heard 
some of the words which the old gentleman spoke, and 
they fell heavih- upon her ; for, he was telling Manassa that 
just as many jumps as it took him to get home, that many 
weeks it would be before he should come back. The young 
man apparently realized the force of the argument, and was 
trying to get to St. George with as fcAv jumps as possible. 
Indeed, it looked to Lyda that he was going ten rods at a 
bound. All the while, the hickory was falling across his 
back with amazing rapidity. The scene was of short dura- 



84 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

tion ; for, while she was still silently sitting under the tree 
and looking toward them, they disappeared in the thicket, 
and, after a little ripping and tearing through the brush, all 
was still. 

The scenes and conversations that followed at the Hol- 
bert cabin, as well as at Minear's, we can only imagine. 
But, the result of the whole affair might plainly have been 
foreseen. Thrashing the young man is not the proper way 
to break him from waiting upon the girl of his choice. So 
it proved in this case. Manassa resolved to marry the fair 
young Lyda, no matter who should oppose. She was as 
fully resolved to brave all opposition in her attachment for 
him. When two young people arrive at this conclusion, it 
is useless for relatives or any one else to interfere. Such 
opposition may delay but cannot prevent the final consum- 
mation of the lovers' plans. In this case, however, the 
Holbert family did all they could to assist the young couple, 
so the opposition was all on one side. 

Manassa and Lyda laid plans to elope and get married. 
But David Minear knew nothing of it. He supposed that 
the thrashing had broken up the affair, and that Manassa 
would pursue his foolish course no further. 

It was again on Sunday, and the young people of St. 
George started to the singing-school in the Horse Shoe. 
Manassa Minear started Avith the others ; but he had no 
intention of the singing. It was now in the fall of the year. 
His course of love, since it had been interrupted on that 
summer evening, had not run as smoothly as a poetical 
river. However, he had managed to see Lyda in the mean- 
tinse, and had arranged it Avitli her and the rest of the fam- 
ily that she should elope with him at any time he should 
call for her. 



MISCELLANIES. 85 

On that morning, instead of crossing the river at the 
Horse Shoe Ford, as he should have done to have gone to 
the singing, he continued up the north bank, unobserved bj 
his companions, who were some distance ahead of him. He 
was on horseback this time. He went directly to Holbert's 
and told Lyda to get on the horse behind him, and not to 
loose much time. He explained the nature of the case. 
She was a brave girl, and did not waste a moment in getting 
ready. Her brother caught the only horse belonging to the 
family, and was ready to accompany them. Lyda got on 
behind Manassa, and they were oflf for Marj'land. It was 
not yet noon, but they did not wait for dinner. They knew 
that the Minears would follow them ; and the success of the 
undertaking depended upon speed. They followed the lit- 
tle path leading vip Horse Shoe Eun. Tliis they traveled 
seven miles, and then turned up Lead Mine, by the old trail 
marked out by Capt. James Parsons. Thus they reached 
Maryland, and were formally married. 

When the young people who went to the singing returned 
to St. George, they reported that Manassa had not been 
there, nor Lyda either. It was at once suspected that he 
had gone to Holbert's, and Da>'id Minear followed again, 
determined to bring matters to a crisis. He went to Hol- 
bert's house, and not seeing Manassa, asked if he had been 
there. They answered him that he called a few minutes, 
but must be twenty miles away by that time. Holberts 
expected to see him fly into a passion at this disclosure ; 
but they were disappointed. He questioned them closely 
about the matter, and when the young couple was expected 
back. When they had answered him, he said that if they 
were married, it was all right, as it was no use to make a 
fuss about it. He left an invitation for them to come down 



86 HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

ns soon as tlie;^ returned, and with this lie went home. 
They were entirely' successful, and got safely home the 
third day. 

If the memories of old people are to be credited in the 
matter, the youug couple did not find the course of married 
life as poetical as they had expected. For, though Lyda 
was young, she had a great deal of industry about her, and 
she made Manassa work harder than he wanted to, and he 
got tired of it, and, to keep from hoeing in the truck-patch, 
he dug a hole under the fence in a weedy corner and toled 
the hogs in. This did not mend matters much, for Lyda 
found it out, and made him build new fences around every 
lot on the place ; and, besides, made him build a pen for 
the hogs, and then pull weeds all summer to feed them. 



CHAPTER IV. 

21 IS CEL L A NI ES. 

The . material for a cliapter ou the liistory of Tucker 
County for two score years next following the close of the 
Indian troubles, in 1781, is meager in the extreme. Almost 
nothing at all, of an exciting nature, is left on record. The 
Indian wars were at an end, and no massacres or exploits 
or adventures are to be narrated. It was a silent epoch in 
our history. But, as Carlj'le teaches, these silent periods in 
the history of a people are the most prolific of great things. 
It is a time when everytliing is building. Every man is 
attendinii; to his own work. No creat interference disturbs 
the welfare of all. The whole country is thriving together, 
and there is no jar or collision to attract attention. It is 
not the building up but the tearing down that constitutes 
the violent crashes in a people's annals. It has been rep- 
resented similar to a tree that grows noiselessly for' a thou- 
sand 3'ears ; but, when the whirlwind overthrows it, it falls 
with a crash. Thus a nation grows and grows for ages, 
and if everytliing is prosperous, not a discord tells of exist- 
ence. But, when commotions or rebellions overthrow it, 
the fall is heard 

To Macedonand Artaxerxes' throne. 

But, this digression is out of place in a county history. 
However, this book is not meant to be a liistory of Tucker 
County. It is designed only as a series of annals, and is not 
intended to be a complete history. But, while this is the 
ease, nothing on the subject, deemed Avorthy to l)e remem- 



88 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

bered, will be left untold. There is little niiiterial, of tlie 
nature of Acts of the Legislature mid railroad and turn- 
pike meetings and resolutions, from Avhich to till a book. 
But, if there were tons of such, thej would be given very 
little attention b}' the writer of these pages. Tucker County 
Las never had any great movements on these subjects. All 
of importance that the Legislature has ever done for Tucker 
can be told in ten lines. The reports of road surveys, and 
the meetings consecpient thereon, can be dismissed with 
still less attention. Therefore, another class of material 
must be had. The people of our county do not care about 
the proceedings of Congress and the Legislature in matters 
now forgotten, that never were of much importance and are 
now of none. This is, at best, a dr}' subject to all, except a 
very few, who, for some special reason, are interested 
therein, 

But Tucker County possesses exhaustless stores of mat- 
ter that is of interest to her people. It is the biography of 
lier people ; an account of Avliat the people have done. 
Each man has done something, or said something, or tried 
to do something that his friends and neighbors Avould like 
to know. Of course, every man cannot be represented in a 
book of this size. Many who deserve a history must be 
left out, because there is not room for all. It is a hard 
thing to decide who shall be made the leading spirits for 
the hundred years after the close of the Indian wars to the 
present time. Before that, Ca]it. James Parsons and John 
Minear were clearl}^ the most prominent men. But, since 
then, there are a few individuals around whom the history 
of the county seenis to cluster. 

Those Avho have fought the most battles are not necessa- 
rily the greatest men. The laborers who dug out the grubs 



MISCELLANIES. 89 

from our Yalleys and hills ; avIio planted our orchards ; who 
built our churches and school-houses ; who made our roads ; 
who improved the morals and intelligence of the country 
by their examples of honesty and industry ; who were ever 
ready to lend a helping hand to the unfortunate ; who never 
hung back when a good cause needed friends ; who did to 
others as they wished others to do to them — these are our 
great men. Such are always great; and Tucker, though 
hemmed in by mountains and nearly excluded from otlier 
parts of the world, has now, and has had from the first, just 
such men. They are found everywhere upon her hills and 
in her valleys. They are not all rich in this world's goods ; 
but none of them are too poor to be honest. They have 
not all held office ; tlie}^ have not all fought battles ; the}' 
Lave not all seen distant countries ; but they have all been 
upright citizens, and have done well what they have done. 

Tucker County likeAvise has had and still has men who 
have taken an active part in our wars, and in our times of 
danger, were ever in the front. The history of James Par- 
sons and John Miuear has been given. Since their day 
there have been others none the less worthy tov be remem- 
bered. 

During the civil war the struggle was intense and bitter 
in this county. The two parties, north and south, were 
nearly equal. The mountains and fastnesses were the 
rendezvous for scouts and sharpshooters. The history of 
the war, as it influenced this section of the county, will be 
given at some length further on. No sides will be taken in 
writing on that subject. Some of our best citizens took the 
side of the South, and others equally good espoused the 
cause of the North. The men who thus arrayed themselves 
against each otlier in that deadly strife, were honest and 



90 HISTOEY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

conscientious in what they did. They upheld and fought for 
what they belived to be right. Wlien a man risks his life 
for a cause, he believes that the cause is right. This must 
not be questioned. Some of our brave men joined the Fed- 
eral armies, and some the Confederate. Honor to the blue 
and gray. The storm is now passed beyond the horizon ; 
and, there is no occasion to recall those dark and bloody 
times except to show that we had men then who did not 
shrink from dut}'. Such men as Dr. Solomon Parsons 
stood up for the Union ; and such as Dr. E. Harper cast 
the fortunes into the cause of Confederacy. Both, and all 
like them, deserve a place in our county's historj', no matter 
whether they loved the stars and stripes or stars and bars. 
But, this will come in at the proper time and place. 

Y^hen the Indian trouble ended, about 1781, our county 
had only a few people. The settlement did not extend far 
from the river. The people Avorked hard, and took few 
holidaj^s. They had to earn their bread hj the sweat of 
their brows, and no time Avas allowed for idleness. The 
heavy timber was removed from it only b}- excessive labor. 
The farmers worked in their clearings during the late fall, 
the winter and the early spring. When summer came they 
were emploj'ed in raising their crop of corn. The people 
generally ate corn bread. AVlieat was nearl}- unknown in 
the early years. A portion of the autumn was often spent 
by the men in hunting deer and bear. 

It is difficult to give ]~)articulars of individuals who lived 
in the county in the latter part of the last century and the 
first of this. Some are lemembtned ; but little more than 
their names come down to us. James Gotf seems to have 
been one of the leading men in early times. He lived on 
Cheat River, near the Preston County line, and at one time 



MISCELLANIES. 91 

owned the greater portion of the hind from the Minear 
chxini to Rowlesburg. He worked incessantly on his farms, 
and ahvaj's had corn to selh His price was fifty cents a 
bushel ; and, no matter what other people sold at, he would 
take nothing more or less than his price. His house had 
no floor, except the ground. They ate bread and meat at 
his house. This diet was unvaried," except when a pot of 
"greens" — a dish of some plant cooked — was substituted for 
meat ; or a kettle of corn meal mush took the place of 
bread. All were welcome to the hospitalities of his cabin, 
although a stranger might have thought the family rough 
in manners. They did not mean to be rude. They were 
open in their actions. Indeed, the eastern land agent, who 
stopped there over night, must have thought so. He sat 
by the fire talking and wondering where supper was coming 
from. He could see no preparations for the evening meal, 
except a big pot at one end of the fireplace, where Mrs. 
Goff sat stirring the kettle's contents. At length it was 
carried to the central ^art of the floor, and a gourd of milk 
was emptied into it, and a dozen wooden spoons were 
provided. 

While the hungry stranger was watching these proceed- 
ings, and wondering what the sequence w^ould be, Mrs. Goff 
announced that supper was ready, Mr. Gofl' sat a moment 
and then dragged his stool up to the mush-pot, saying to 
the visitor: ""Well, if you don't want any supper, you can 
sit there." The children were already around the kettle, 
scooping out the mush and milk with the large wooden 
spoons, and seeming to enter with gusto into the repast. 
Mr. and Mrs. Goff joined the circle ; and all fell to eating 
with such voracity that no time was left for asking or an- 
swering questions. No cups or dishes were used. All ate 



92 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

directly from the pot, and there was no little crowding from 
those who feared that they might not get their fnll share. 

The stranger got no other invitation to eat ; bnt, by this 
time, he had come to see that he would get no supper un- 
less he should go boldly forward, seize a spoon and take his 
chances with the rest. This he did. He pidled his stool 
forAvard and commenced eating. Mr. Goff crowded a little 
to one side, remarking with an oath: "By — , I thought 
you'd come to it." The meal passed without further inci- 
dent, and the next morning the land agent fled back to 
Winchester with a story that no one there believed. 

That same year there was a scarcity in the country. 
Goflf had corn, but hardly anybody else had. People came 
from all parts to buy from him. Two young men came 
down from the Glades in Maryland. One had been there 
before ; but the other had not. The one who had been 
there entertained the other, while on the road, by picturing 
to liim what a grand residence Goff' s was, and admonished 
him not to show himself ill-bred by undue staring about 
the pictured walls and carpeted floors. By the time the}' 
drcAv near the plantation, the young man, who had believed 
all that his companion had told him, was looking for a 
splendid residence, and picturesque surroundings. Mark 
bis surprise when he came suddenly up to the front, and 
onl}', door of the log cabin. He was immediately ushered 
in at the opening. He was looking so wildly about him 
that he did not notice the log that formed the door-sill; 
and, stumbling over it, he fell headlong into the house. 
Instead of landing upon Brussels cai-jiet, as he might have 
expected, he found himself sprawling in the dust and ashes 
of the earth-floor. Not till then did he realize that he had 
been made the subject of a practical joke. 



MISCELLANIES. 93 

The land whicli Goff settled upon had previously been 
occupied by a man named Jorden. It is not known when 
Jorden left it or when Goff purchased it. But, Goff was 
there in 1786. He was an untiring worker; and, old men 
still remember how he made his boys work. In the long 
days of June, when daylight comes at four, he would be in 
the corn-field before the first 'gleam of dawn. He never 
called his boys to work, nor even waked them ; but, if any 
one was not in the field as soon as it was light enough to 
distinguish weeds from corn, that one got a sound thrashing. 

Of course, by working so hard he made money. What 
he made he saved. He would not spend a cent for any- 
thing, unless it was absolutely necessary. He kept his cash 
in a buck-skin sack, and buried it in one corner of the dirt 
floor. In the course of time, he came to be a considerable 
money-lender. Those who came to borrow often marked 
with surprise that he picked up a handspike Avhich was used 
as a poker, and dug deep into the ground-floor, and turned 
out the foul sack, filled with silver and gold. 

When James Parsons had obtained deeds for his lands in 
the Horse Shoe, he divided them among his three sons — 
Isaac, Solomon and Jonathan. Isaac lived where Joseph 
Parsons, Esq., now resides. The farm now osvned by Mr. 
S. B. Wamsle}", was given to Jonathan ; and Hon. S. E. 
Parsons now owns the farm that was allotted to Solomon. 

Thomas Parsons, brother of James Parsons, and partner 
with him when they first purchased their lands, divided his 
lands among his four sons — William, James, Isaac and 
George. The descendants of these, as well as those of 
James Parsons, still reside on these farms. Nicholas and 
George Parsons, still living, are the sons of Isaac, and 
grandsons of Thomas. The late W. K. Parsons, and An- 



94 HISTOllY or TUCKEE COUNTY. 

dre-\v and Abraham Parsons, now of California, are sons of 
James Parsons. Job Parsons, and Solomon Parsons were 
sons of William Parsons. 

The lands along the river, above St. George, have ever 
since their first settlement been in the Parsons family. This 
is the finest agricultural land in the county; and those who 
have owned it have alwaj'S belonged to the Avealthy class of 
our citizens. They have held nearly half the offices in the 
county. They are not and never were all of one political 
party. They have usuall}' been nearly equally divided. 
Generall}' speaking, James Parsons' descendants have leant 
toward the "Whig and Pvepublican parties; while those of 
Thomas voted the opposite ticket. At present, altogether, 
there are more Democrats than Piepublicans. Judge S. E. 
Parsons first voted in 1859, and cast his ballot for the 
"Whigs. Since then he has voted with the Democrats, and 
has always been a strong Union man. The otliers of his 
immediate relatives have not supported the Democratic 
ticket ; but nearly all the others of the name, including Jo- 
seph, AA ard and Jesse Parsons, are Democrats. 

The Bonnifield family came into notice very early in the 
histor}' of Tucker, though not so early as those of Parsons 
and Minear. The first of that name in the county was 
Samuel Bonnifield. He came to the Horse Shoe from 
Eastern Yirginia sometime before the commencement of the 
present centuiy. Not much is known of his ancestry, ex- 
cept that the}' were of French extraction. The name in 
that country was Bonnifant ; but, being Anglicized, it was 
as it now is. There are still difi'erent spellings for it. Eep- 
resentatives of the family si^ell it Bonafield, as those in 
Preston County. Others drop an "n" from it. 

AMiere "\^'ashington City now stands was the old Bonni- 



MISCELLANIES. 05 

Held homestead. Whether they owned the hiiid or not is 
unknown. At any rate, they Avere engaged in cnltivating 
tobacco there ; and, there in 1752, Samuel Bonnifiekl was 
born. His father's name was Gregory, and his grandfather's 
■vsas Lnke.'"" Nothing of note occurred in Samuel's life 
until he' was moved to ramble, and left his paternal roof. 
The next heard of him was in the summer of 177-4. He was 
then in Fauquier County, Virginia. 

It Avas in that year that there broke out a trouble Avith 
the Indians, called Dunmore's War. The Indians com- 
menced killing people along the frontiers. The only set- 
tlement in Tucker, that in the Horse Shoe, was broken up. 
The Governor of Virginia, Lord Dunmore, decided to raise 
an army, march into the Indian country of Ohio, and burn 
all the Indian towns, so that these hives from Avhicli the 
savages swarmed, might be destroyed. Gen. Andrew Lewis 
and Governor Dunmore each was to raise an army and 



"While searching for other historical matter, at Brownsville, Ohio, in the spring of 
1SS4, 1 happened upon an old legend of the Bonnitield family, a little different from 
that of the Tucker County family. It is certain tliat the Bonniilelds there and those In 
Tucker, Preston and in the West, all belong to the same stock, and I am inclined to 
credit the Ohio legend, which narrates the first coming t)f the Bonniilelds to America. 
Tlie story runneth thus : Very early In the history of America, probably about the 
close of the ITth century, three brothers named Bonnitield became desirous of leaving 
England for America. They belonged to the poor class, although intelligent, and had 
not money to pay their passage to our shores. At that time, it was a ciistom among 
those who had no money and who wanted to emigrate to the New World, to sell them- 
selves or mortgage themselves to the master of some vessel. He would then bring 
them over, and sell his claim upon them for enough cash in hand to pay him for their 
passage. The emigrants were then bound In servitude to the purchaser until their 
wages amounted to the sum paid the master of the vessel. After that they were free. 

The three Bonnitield brothers came to America in that manner, and were sold in 
Baltimore. One was carried to Virginia, one to Maryland and the third was purchased 
by a specidator and was taken to Florida. Those in Maryland and Virginia each had 
a family, and the families are still distinguished apart, and are nearly equal In the 
number of representatives ; but of hun who went to Florida no tidings has ever been 
heard. Whether he died a victim to the fevers of that sultry land, or whether in the 
wars of the Spanish, French and Indians he was killed, or, whether his family Is no^y 
blended with the population of Florida, Is unknown. All the Bonniilelds In America, 
so far as Is known, are the descendants of the two brothers who settled in Virginia 
and Maryland. Samuel Bonnifleld belonged to the :Maryland family, and those in 
Ohio about Zanesville and Brownsville to the Virginia family. 



96 HISTOIIY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

proceed to the inoutli of tlie Great KanaAvlia, where they 
would unite and invade the Indian country. Dnnmore col- 
lected his troops in the northern part of Virginia, while 
Lewis enlisted his from counties further south. 

When Samuel Bonnifield reached Fauquier County, he 
found the most ambitious young men enlisting in Lewis' 
Army. Although young Bonnifield was not a citizen of Vir- 
ginia and had never seen Avar, yet he Avas no less ambitious 
and no less adventurous than the 3'oung soldiers of Virginia; 
and, he applied and obtained a place in the ranks as a 
common soldier. 

The army marched to Camp Union, now LeAvisburg, 
Greenbrier County, Avhere it Avas joined by fift}' men, under 
Even Shelby, who had come all the AA^ay from North Caro- 
lina to fight in the Avar. General Isaac Shelb}", the Gov- 
ernor of Kentuck}' and Secretary of AVar, Avas also in the 
arm}', and Avitli him Bonnifield formed an intimate acquaint- 
ance.'"" From LeAvisburg, the army proceeded to Point 
Pleasant. Some Aveut on foot, and some made canoes at 
the mouth of the Gauley River and floated down the Ka- 
iiaAvha to the Ohio. Bonnifield Avas among the latter. 

On the evening of October 9, eleven hundred men Avere 
encamped at Point Pleasant. That evening a large Indian 
army crossed the Ohio not far above, and lay hid in the 
Avoods, Avhile some of the Indians gobbled like turkej's to 
decoy the soldiers from camp. The plan succeeded ; and, 
before day the next morning, some men Avcnt out to shoot 
the turke3"s. But, instead of turkeys, tlicy foimd Indians, 
and only one man got aAvay. He ran back to camp and 

* Evan Shelby was the father of Isaac Slielby, and was a great tighter. In General 
Forbes' campaign against Fort Ducniesne, he found nn Indian spy sneaking around 
the camp, and InumHliately gave chase to the rascal. 'IMie Indian ran for Ills life, but 
Shelby caught and killed him. 



lu'at. K;ui}nv1ia, wlicre they 
.>unraove col- 
li era part of Virgiuiix, while 
s fiLvther soiitli. 

'nd Fauquier County, he 

mc-u • V. listing in Lewis* 

tizen of Vir- 

ite was no less ambitious 

>ungsokl5ei"s of Virginia; 

Lewisburg, 

med by liltj' men, under 

way from North Oaro- 

Isaac Shelby, the Gov- 

f War, was also in the 

itod an intimate acquaint- 

^eded to Point 

;;au sooic made canoes at 

.,;,,i fioif-.<i down the Ka- 

V\c latter. 

d men were 

large India) i 

hid in the 

i^nvkej's to 

'<d; and, 

to shoot 

Indians 








Mrs Dr Bonnifield. 



Dr a. Bonnifield 





Mrs Enoch Miksar 



Enoch Minear 



MISCELLANIES. 97 

said that lie had seen three hundred thousand Indians ; but 
it is uoAV thought that liis estimate Avas three hundred 
times too large. 

In a few minutes the battle commenced, and was fought 
hard all da}'. Bonnifield and Isaac Shell)}' fought side bj 
side, and at least one Indian, who kept bobbing his head 
up from behind a log, got his eternal (piietus from their 
litles. The Indians and white men fought behind trees and 
logs, and it was the hardest and longest contested battle 
ever fought with the Indians in America. But about sunset 
the Indians found themselves grievously set upon b}- three 
hundred soldiers who had crept through the weeds and got 
in their rear. The whole Indian army fled, yelling and 
screaming. Bonnifield and some others ran after them and 
saw them crossing the Ohio on logs and rafts. In this they 
were not succeeding well ; for the logs kept rolling so that 
they all fell ofl:' into the water and had to swim out. 

The Virginian army crossed into Ohio and hurried on to 
help kill the Indians and burn the towns on the Scioto, 
where Dunmore, who had crossed the Ohio at Parkersburg, 
then was. The Indians were so l)adly whipped that they 
made peace without an}' more fighting. The Virginians lost 
one-fifth of their men in killed and wounded. The dead 
were buried, and the wounded were left in care of a com- 
pany of soldiers. Bonnifield was among those who took 
care of the wounded. He staid there all Mduter; and when 
he was discharged in the spring, he and a companion started 
home alone. They failed to kill any game, and came near 
starving to death. While wandering about in Greenbrier 
County, they came to a house where lived a man named 
McClimg, and whose descendants still live there. He gave 
the famished soldiers all tliey wanted, but stood by them to 
keep them from eating themselves to death. 



98 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

Bonnifiekl had scarcely reached Yirginia when the Revo- 
lutionary War came on, and he at once joined tlie American 
army, and fought through the whole war. At the battle of 
Germantown he was with his old comrade of Point Pleas- 
ant, Gen. George Matthevi's. He was at the battle of Bran- 
dywine, and was near by when Lafa^-ette was wounded. 
He Avas at Yorktown, and saw General O'Hara surrender 
the sword of Cornwallis. This ended his history as a 
soldier. 

AYhen the Revolution came to an end, in 1781, Samuel 
Bonnitield was twenty-nine years old. He now turned his 
attention to farming, having first married Dorcas James, a 
young lady of a respectable family in Yirginia, and a rela- 
tion of the James family now in Tucker. Soon after his 
marriage, but in what year is unknown, he came to Cheat 
River, and settled in the Horse Shoe. . This was before the 
commencement of the present century. 

He farmed -svitli success for some years, and while in the 
Horse Shoe, in 1709, his son, Dr. Arnold Bonniheld was 
born. About this time, the Horse Shoe was legally survey- 
ed, and it Avas then found that the land whereon Bonnifield 
resided was not his, but belonged to James Parsons. With 
this discovery, Bonnifield commenced looking for another 
farm, and foimd one suitable at Limestone, and moved to it. 

Prom this time on, he lived the life of a farmer, and 
raised a large family, whose descendants ma}' now be found 
in half the states of the Union. He always manifested a 
disposition to roam the woods and be alone ; and, in his old 
age, he became more and more attached to a hunter's life. 
He spent a large part of the fall and winter in the woods ; 
and, though eighty years of age, he thought it no hardship 
to sleep by his camp fire, when snow was a foot deep, and 



MISCELLANIES. 99 

his clothing was drenched from having waded creeks and 
runs all day. He was small in stature; but his strength 
seemed exhaustless. He died at the age of ninety-five, and 
was buried on Grave^-ard Hill, near the present residence 
of Dr. Bonnifield, on Horse Shoe Run. 

The descendants of some of his relations subsequently 
found their way into Tucker County; but none are there 
now, all having emigrated to the West. 

Dr. Arnold Bonnifield, a son of Samuel Bonnifield, has 
always been a citizen of the county, and is now its oldest 
resident, with the exception of George Long, of Dry Fork. 
He Avas concerned in all the early history of the county, 
after he became a man, until of late years. He was the 
first clerk of the circuit and county coiu'ts of Tucker 
County. 

But his greatest influence has not been as a politician or 
soldier, biit as a social reformer. From his earliest years, 
he showed a strong desire to become a scholar ; but, during 
his early years, hard work and few advantages made it a 
hard thing for him to pursue his studies. Mathematics was 
his favorite science ; and he became master of all the 
branches of it, except the higher departments of the calcu- 
lus. The greater part of this was attained without the use 
of books ; for a rude edition of arithmetic, and a few leaves 
of algebra and geometry, were about all the instruction he 
had until his twenty-fourth year, when he attended a few 
sessions of school at Clarksburg. 

While a boy, he was accustomed to solve his problems 
and demonstrate his theorems on a smooth stone, using a 
gravel for a pencil. In this manner he gained the greater 
part of his mathematical education. His early life was 
spent on his father's farm at Limestone, where he worked 



100 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

jind studied until liis twenty-fourth year. After liis return 
from school at Clarksburg, he again devoted himself to farm 
work. At the age of twenty-six he married Elizabeth Mi- 
near, granddaughter of John Minear. Shortl}^ afterwards, 
he moved from Limestone to his present home on Horse 
Shoe Run. He took a course in medicine, and practiced 
that profession until old age forced him to retire from it. 
While he practiced, he stood pre-eminently above all other 
physicians in the county. 

He has been an extensive traveler, having visited the 
eastern and western states. He was in Missouri at an early 
day, and returned home on horseback, the journe}' from 
there home occupying a month of time. His influence on 
the destiny of the county has been exerted in a quiet way ; 
but that it has been material is to be seen in the fact that 
none are more favoral^ly known, and none are held in 
Greater esteem than he. 

As late as 1840, there were very fcAv settlements in the 
count}', except along the river, and in the narrow bottoms 
of the larger creeks. The mountains were mostly unbroken 
wildernesses. Here and there might be seen the cabin of a 
settler who was opening up a farm among the hills. About 
this time, or more exactl}', in the fall of 183G, the region 
about the head waters of Clover Run began to be settled. 
This is now Clover District. The first house, excex)t imme- 
diately on the bottom land (^f Clover, was that built by 
Isaac Phillips, father of Moses Phillips, Esq. This was in 
1836, when Moses Phillips was six years of age. The cabin 
was without " door, floor or chimney," as he has expressed 
it. But it Avas the commencement of a settlement that now 
contains a fair portion of our count^-'s people. For as soon 
as it became known that Phillips' cabin had been built 



MISCELLANIES. 101 

other settlers came into tlie neigliborliood and took up lauds 
and went to work. Tlius, by 1840, some five families, and 
probably thirty children, were in the neighborhood ; and 
the dense forests as Avell as the dens of panthers and bears, 
began to be broken np. 

It was now felt that there onglit to be some provision 
made for educating the children of the neAV settlement ; for, 
although cut off from many of the conveniences of life, and 
destined to unceasing hard Avork, the pioneers of Tucker 
have never neglected the education of their children. 
Sometimes the advantages were few and far between ; but, 
such as they were, they were made the most of. The 
children often got no more than ten months of schooling in 
their lives. Moses Phillips got only nine, and that was at 
the new school-house, which the five families built on 
Clover Kuu in 1840. One Avho attended there has thus 
spoken of it: "It was built of round poles, chunked and 
daubed. The earth inside, which composed the floor, was 
completely leveled off. A few rocks, thrown up at one end, 
on the inside, formed the chimney. A small hole was cut 
in one side, and paper was fastened over it. This was the 

windoAv. The door was made of clapboards 

Some of the scholars went to this school barefooted with- 
out njissing a day." 

This short quotation is inserted because it is a faithful 
description of the country school-houses of that day. They 
were rude and would l)e laughed at now ; but they an- 
swered their purpose, and have passed away only because 
they so enlightened the country that better buildings were 
demanded. Those avIio have aided in the settlement and 
progress of the Clover District, can now see that they have 
not labored in vain. From 1840, this region became an 



102 HlSTOllY or TUCKER COUNTY. 

important part of the county, and its liistor}', and the 
biography of its people Avill be given in the succeeding 
chapters. 

Even before the settlements in the mountains ^vest of St. 
George "vvere commenced, cabins were built in the eastern 
part of the county. The Dumires seem to have taken the 
lead in this quarter ; and, ever since, they have been in the 
front, in the work of building up and improving the district 
about the upper tributaries of Horse Shoe Run. The family- 
is now numerous, and exercises much influence on the 
county att'airs. 

The name is spelled in several ways; but all are traced 
to the same source. Dumire and Domire are l)otli now 
used. Germaiiy was the native country of this family, as 
well as of the Minears. Einehart Dumire'"' spent his early 
years at sea. He was born in 1765. He went to China 
three times, and then joined a winding ship and sailed for 
the Arctic Ocean. Such a voyage is now labori(5us and 
fraught with danger; but it was far more so then, and none 
but the stoutest constitutions could stand it. Dumire spent 
three years among the frozen islands and drifting icebergs, 
before he turned toward home. When he reached his 
country, after such a trip, one Avoiild suppose that he would 
not repeat the undertaking. But he again sailed for the 
North, and was absent three years in the dark oceans 
of eternal winter. A third time he went upon his danger- 
ous voyage to the North,. and a third time was gone three 
years. All in all, he liad now spent twenty-three years on 
tlie ocean. He had coasted along the shores of Europe, 
Asia and Africa ; six times had lie doubled the Cape of Good 

* The name Rlnehart Ih spelled In two ways. One as above and the other Rhlnchart. 
Belnsf a proper name, the authority for Its spelling rests upon those who use it most. 



MISCELLANIES. 103 

Hoj)e, crossed the wide expanse of the Indian Ocean, 
and visited the spice ishmds of the South seas. 

He was jet a .young man, only thirt^'-fonr j^ears of age. 
This Avas in 1799. Ho resolved to emigrate to xlmerica. 
With his family, he reached his destination and selected 
him a home on Stemple Ridge, in Tucker Countj-. This 
may not have been the first cabin built in that section ; Init 
it was s'jrely among the first. His sons, among whom were 
John, Daniel, Rineh-irt and Frederic, soon Ijecame men, 
and each commenced a settlement of his own. Meanwhile, 
the progress of the county Avas going steadily forward. The 
paths began to bs widened into roads, and the people built 
better houses. The cornhelds were enlarged, were better 
fenced and better tilled. Schools were growing more nu- 
merous. The teachers were paid from private subscriptions 
and the wages were from five to ten dollars a month. 
Churches were given some attention, and' the people were 
not unlearned in good behavior and morality. Religious 
services were still held in private houses or in school- 
houses. Old and young alike attended the meetings, and 
the good influence of these associations had its effect 
evers'wliere, in training the 3-oung to refined ideas of hu- 
man existence. The meetings were conducted by pious 
men, called " class leaders," and regularly ordained minis- 
ters were few. But the people then were probabW as gc^od 
as the}' are now. 

Very early in this century, Stephen Losh came to Horse 
Shoe Run, and settled where Rufus Maxwell now lives. 
A native of Germam', born in 1781, he lived a short time in 
Maryland, and then moved to Tucker. He found Holbert's 
house deserted and in ruins. Near about were a few little 
fields, that Holbert had cleared. In one of these lie found 



104 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

an apple trci', aiul liuilt liis shanty uiuTer its Ijranclies. 
The lint v.liic-li lie erected ^vas made of buckeye logs. He 
improved the land around his cabin and ]ilaiited a cro]") of 
corn. Before long, ho found that he was on the land of 
Captain Parsons, and according!}' began looking about for 
another place. The nearest neighbor he had, lived at the 
mouth of llaccoon, about a mile distant, and Losh Avould 
Lave selected a site just above him ; but, a quarrel having 
meaiiAvhile arisen between them, Losh thought it best to get 
farther from his troublesonn^ neighbor. Accordingly, he se- 
lected him a site three miles further up Horse Shoe Run ; 
and in a short time, Michael Hansford took up the land on 
Hansford Run, where Losh had thought of settling. This 
land has ever since been known as the Hansford Place, and 
the run as Hansford or Mike's Run. He had a blacksmith 
bliop there, the remains of which may still be seen, on the 
farm of Arnold Bonnifield. 

Stephen Losh was connected with the War of 1812, al- 
though he was not a regular soldier. He had something to 
do Avith the wagon trains; and, in that cajjiicity, he was in 
South Carolina., and visited Charleston. When he turned 
liis attention to farming on Horse Shoe Run, he built a grist 
mill, and did a good business until his mill washed away. 
About this time occurred the "rainy summer, " so called by 
the uldest citizens. It rained almost constantly from the 
iirst of .7une till late in August. Cro])s were drowned and 
chilled so that the following year was one of great scarcity. 
Potatoes were n)a(le to answer for bread. Stephen Losh 
died on Horse Shoe Run, in 1S74, at the agi' of niuety- 
tlinu'. He left several children, notably among whom was 
William Losh, Sr. He is still living, and has been a re- 
markable man. Fond of travel, lie has gratified this pas- 



MISCELLANIES. 105 

sion. He has visited tlie "Western States several times, the 
last time after he was seTeutv-fiye years of age. He is 
minntelj acquainted with Ohio from Lake Erie to the Ohio 
Eiver on the South. He first went there in 1825, in com- 
pany with Nicholas and George Parsons. They went on 
foot, and explored thoroughly the country as they went. It 
was in the spring of the year and the young men felt that 
farmers ought to be at work. So, Avhile passing through 
Gilmer County, when they saw a lazy young granger lying 
on the fence sunning himself, while his plow team stood 
idle in tlie furrow, they ^-elled at him : " Get up there, you 
infernal fool, and go to work; lounge around all spring, and 
next winter you will trot over the country with a sack under 
jour arm, hunting something to eat." The young man lit 
oif the fence in the twinkling of an eye, and grabbing up a 
hand full of rocks, commenced pelting the strangers, and 
neglected not to lieap Tipon them various vile epithets, and 
called them all the ugly names he could think of. But they 
passed on, and were presently overtaken by a man on 
liorsebnck, who wanted to know what they had done to the 
young granger to put him in such a terrible rage. They 
related Avhat they had seen, and what they had said to him. 
The man asked if they Avere strangers in the country, and 
they told him they were. ""Well," said the man, "you hit 
it exacih-. That lazy scamp Avon't Avork in the summer, and 
buys bread on credit in the Avinter." William Losli re- 
mained in Ohio a long time, and liauled freight from Lake 
Erie to the Muskingum River. But Nicholas and George 
Parsons soon came back, and ever after remained Avhere 
they still live. 

William Losh lias ahvays l>een a hard-working man. 
But, after the fall Avork Avas done, it was always his delight 



10(1 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

to spend a inontli or six weeks in tlie woods hunting. He 
lias been, beyond a doubt, the best and most successful 
woodsman of Tucker County-. Tlie country beyond Back- 
bone Mountain, Canada, as it is called, has been his hunt- 
ing ground for years. No nook or corner of that uninhabi- 
ted Avilderness is unknown to him ; and deer and bear 
innumerable have fallen l)efore the deadl}' aim of his rifle. 
In his younger days, no man was a better marksman than 
he; and, even now, though cight^^-four years of age, very 
few can equal him. He has always been a peaceable man ; 
but no man ever imposed upon him with impunity. If 
Tucker County has produced a man, that with training 
could have pounded Slade or Sullivan, "William Losh must 
be the man. 

The peculiarities and characteristics of all his ancestors 
seem to have concentered in John Losh, son of "William 
Losli, born in ()liio about 1881. He was the eldest child, 
and was a genius from his infancy. AVlien he was a small 
child his parents moved to Horse Shoe Run, where "William 
Losh, Jr., now lives. This was John Losh's home as long 
as he remained in Tucker. He spent his idle hours con- 
structing to3's, curious traps and automatic flying machines, 
and wooden rats that \\ould run across the floor, and 
leather bumble bees that Avould buzz and hum. He was of 
a light complexion, and had blue e^-es. 

When he became a man, he was as much of a rambler as 
his father and grandfather. His time was spent in roaming 
over the hills; and Canada, beyond the mountains, was his 
domain. "Very few but him and his father had ever ven- 
tured into that wilderness. It is a wild country now ; but, 
at tliat time, it was unex]>lored, and the country along 
Black Fork, over one hundred square miles, had not tlie 



MISCELLANIES. 107 

lionie of a liunian being on it. From tlie head of Black 
Fork to the Fairfax Stone was an unbroken forest. The 
timber was primeval. No ax had scarred the trees that 
stood so thick that their branches interlocked for miles, and 
some of the soil beneath had not been touched by a sun- 
beam for ages. Vast 'beds of laurel, in places, Avere so 
matted with the summers and storms of centuries that a 
hunter, who would pass that wa}', must walk on the tops, 
where the branches, that heavy snows had bent and pressed 
together, formed a rough gnarly floor, several feet above 
the ground. Beneath the laurel, there were lairs and dens 
of wild beasts. Bears and panthers had broken tunnels 
through the thickets in all directions; and what deadly 
battles and mortal combats were fought there, when these 
savage kings and t3-rants of the wilderness crossed each 
other's paths, no human eye was there to witness. 

At intervals, deep down under the laurel, streams of 
water wandered through eternal shadows. But, the hunter 
might pass and repass that wa}' and never know that he 
had crossed a stream, unless some accidental opening 
through the net-work on which he trode should reveal to 
him the flowing water. In the summer, the ground be- 
neath the laurel never got dry or warm. The countr}^ is 
nearly as high as the Alleghany Mountains. June comes 
before the ice and packed snow, that the winter has stored 
away in the deep crevices of the rocks, and all over the 
dank ground, begins to yield, in any considerable degree, 
to the summer sunshine. The hidden brooks and rivulets 
are nearly as cold as ice all summer. The ground is damp 
and chill. The huge, cold rocks are constantly beaded with 
drops of dew. During the summer, the more open parts of 
the woods, where there is no laurel, become green with 



108 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

plants, and Aveeds; l)ut under tlie laurel there is little 
difference between summer and winter, except that in winter 
tlie snow hides the desolation and in summer it does not. 

The winters in Canada are longer and colder than along 
the river. Snow lies on the ground from October till May. 
It is often two or three and has been six feet deep. Such 
snoAvs bur}' the laurel thickets so that one cannot well dis- 
cern Avhere they are. At such times, the wild beasts lie 
hidden under snoAv, laurel and all, until hunger compels 
them to prey upon one another or come out to kill deer and 
small animals. The snow soon packs hard enough for them 
to walk upon it. The deer get very poor during a hard 
winter. Tliere is a large kind of rabbits that live in Canada , 
and no j^lace else in the country round about. They are 
.said to be so SAvift that dogs can't catch them. They can 
also climb a leaning tree. In early times tliere Avere Avolves 
and elks in Canada. The country Avas then all covered Avitli 
trees and impenetrable thickets. Not all, for, in a fcAv pla- 
ces, there Avere open patches, called glades or meadoAvs. 
These Avere small, and AA'hy they Avere not covered Avith tim- 
ber is unaccounted for, unless it be because the soil Avill not 
nourish trees, or because the glades Avere recently lakes, 
^froni Avhich the Avater has been drained. Be this as it may, 
the glades are treeless ; but the grass that groAA'S on them 
diiring the brief summer is innnense in (piantity. It is Avell 
suited for hay ; and, Avithin recent years, it has been har- 
vested for tliat purpose. No Avell directed efforts have so 
far been made to cultivate the glades, or, for that matter, to 
cultivate any part of Canada. But it is the opinion of those 
best qualified to judge, that corn, Avheat and oats Avould not 
flourish there. In tlie upper Canaan Valley, farming has 
been tried with success, but everywliere grass does the best. 



MISCELLANIES. 109 

The forests of Canada, except the glades, were unbroken 
when first the wliite man went tliere. The trees stood thick, 
and seemed as grim and unchangeable as the A'ery rocks 
among which they stood. They seemed no older or no 
younger than they had always been. Trees six inches in di- 
ameter looked as old as the giants five and six feet. All the 
dijfiference of a]:)pearance was in the size. 

All Canada and Canaan are essentially the same expanse 
of country. The -vdiole region is a basin, the rim of which 
is the Alleghany and Backbone mountains. The Alleghany 
is on the east, and the Backbone on the west. The two 
mountains thus surround the whole of Canada and Canaan, 
except the narrow gap through which Black Fork flows and 
makes its escape from the valley. The length of this basin, 
from its northern boundary to the upper end of Canaan, is 
about twenty miles, and its breadth five or six miles. 

It is evident that this whole region was once a mountain 
lake, with the Alleghany for its eastern and the Backbone for 
its western and northern shore. There was then no river 
flowing out of it ; for the gap which Black Fork has cut 
throiigh the mountain was then not there. It must have 
been a beautiful lake, extending twenty miles one way and 
five the other. High up, among the very summits of the 
Alleghanies, the cool, bracing breezes of the mountains blew 
softly along the tranquil waters ; and the waves, pure as crys- 
tal, washed the sandy shores for ages and ages, and no hu- 
man being was there to behold it. In the winter, when the 
winds were wild and cold, fearful storms must have swept 
over the lake ; and then, the waves rolled ujiou the beach, 
freezing into huge drifts, and extending from the shore 
inward, until the whole lake was frozen over. 

This was thousands of acres aw. The rains of summer 



110 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

and the snows of winter, in the course of time, filled the 
hike to overflowing. The water began to flow out over the 
lowest place in the mountain. That was at the north- 
western corner, Avhere Black Fork breaks through Backbone 
Mountain. Year by 3'ear, for centuries and millenials, the 
channel wore deeper and deeper, and at last the water of the 
lake was all drained oft', and Canaan and Canada were left 
dry land. Then trees began to grow; and, in due time, for- 
ests covered the whole country, as they did when first the 
white man found his v»'ay into that region. 

This was John Losh's hunting ground. The story of his 
adventures is known beyond Tucker County. Before he 
was fully a man, he commenced making expeditions to 
Canada, and seldom returned spoilless. He had two dogs 
almost as famous as himself. He trained them himself, and 
they were his companions in many a bear hunt. If they 
once came up with a bear, it had little show of getting away. 
They fought it in such a manner that the}' wore it down. 
One dog would l)ay it from the front while the other 
knabbed it by the ham. It Avould turn to lay hold of the 
rear dog, when the other would seize it by the other ham. 
Again it would wheel and give chase to the dog that l)it it 
last. Tliis would give the first dog a chance to come up 
and take another nip from behind.. Thus, up and down 
tnrough the woods, the fight went on. The dogs would not 
join in pitched battle Avith the bear; nor would they 
allow it to escape, or to climb a tree. If it attempted to 
climb, the}' would pull it down. In this manner, they 
worried it and kept it at bay till their master could come up 
and end the encounter by shooting bruin. 

Such a scene Avas common ; but it Avas varied Avhen, as on 
an occasion, the bear caught one of the dogs. The other 



MISCELLANIES. Ill 

dog flew upon tlie beast and fought it, aiid both dogs fought, 
but it could not be' forced to shicken its hokl upon the dog, 
which must soon have been killed had not Losh come up at 
that moment. He saw the situation and would have shot 
the bear, but was afraid of hitting his dogs. But he would 
not see them killed ; so, he drew his butcher knife, and run- 
ning up, leaped upon the bear and stabbed it to death. 

That winter was very cold. The snow fell nearly con- 
stantly for several weeks, till it was six feet deep in Canada. 
All the rocks, logs and laurel were so entirely covered that 
the whole country seemed one vast, unbroken plain of snow, 
with the bare, black trees rising sheer out of it. After the 
snow fell it packed hard enough to Ijcar the weight of a 
man. 

John Losh was soon in Canada. He took as a compan- 
ion his brother-in-law,. James Evans, and they roamed over 
the plains and hills, and passed above the vast laurel thick- 
ets, and had a smooth floor to walk on all the while. Tlie 
top of the snow was frozen into a crust, resembling ice ; and, 
on this they must walk Math care, where the ground was not 
level, lest they shoidd fall. But on level ground, they could 
skate if they liked. 

As they came into camp the third evening, Losh Avas 
walking in front of Evairs, and they talked as they pro- 
ceeded till at length Evans qiiit talking. Losh looked back, 
and his companion was no where to be seen. He had sud- 
denly disappeared ; and Losh knew not but that he had 
been taken off after the manner of Elijah the Tishbite. 
However, he turned back to look for him, and sliortl}' found 
a hole through the snow and heard Evans yelling to be 
helped out. He had broken through and had fallen into 
the cave under a laurel thicket, where the snow could not 



112 HISTOKY OF TUCKEll COUNTY. 

reach the grouiul bv reason of the matted hmrel branches. 
Losh helped him out, and the}- proceeded to their camp. 
Thej canght more deer than they kneAV \vhat to do Avith, 
The animals, in attempting to rnn, Avould stick fast in the 
snow, and the men could walk up and kill them. After they 
had killed as many as they wanted, they let the rest go, 
having first marked them by cutting their ears. Thus em- 
plo^-ed, they spent several days, and Avere on the point of 
starting home Avheu the}- became bewildered, and lost their 
Avay. It is a singular thing that a lost i)ersou is so entirely 
dcA'oid of reason. Familiar objects are as strange to him 
as those are AA'hich he never saAV or heard of. North of the 
equator, a lost person goes round a circle, ahvays bearing 
to the left, Avhile south of the ecpiator it is said to be just 
the reverse in direction — Avhirhvinds north of the equator 
moA'e to the left, and south of it they move to the right. 
'Ohere seems to be some common Liav of nature that controls 
l)oth a lost man and a Avhirlwind. 

When Losh and Evans first became beAvildered, they 
Avere carrying a deer Avhicli they had killed; but after they 
had described tAvo or three circles they threw the deer 
doAvu, and ran on Avithout it. When night came on, their 
situation became Avorse. It Avas cold, and the Avoods Avere 
very dark. They might have biiilt a fire had they not been 
lost; but a lost man builds no fires. They ran as fast as 
they could all night, and Aveut round and round a circle 
without kuoAving it. When morning came they Avere still 
running, althoiigh nearly starved, and scarcely able to keep 
on their feet. If left alone, tlun' never could have gotten 
out. But they had already overstaid their time from 
home, and their families had become uneasy. A company 
of men from Horse Shoe Run went in search of them. 



MISCELLANIES. 113 

Tlieir tracks were found, and tlien the deer, and linully the 
men themselves. They were in the Lxst stage of despair. 
They had eaten nothing for several daj's, and were badly 
frozen. They were walking round and round a tree, and 
there they would probably have died, had not the relief 
party come up, They were taken home, and they hunted 
no more in Canada that winter. 

But no sooner had the summer sun taken tlie snow off, 
than John Losh was again in Canada. This time he was 
looking more for bear than deer, for bear were his chief ob- 
jects of himting. As he passed through the woods, he saw 
three cub-bears playbig. They were quite small, and had 
not sense enough to run. He kept a sharj) lookout for tlie 
old bear, and cornered the cubs between two logs and 
caught them. It would have been an easy matter to have 
killed them ; but he was like Wetzel, who dragged an Indian 
a hundred miles to show the people in the settlement as hat 
a live, wild Indian was like. Losh preferred to carry the 
bear-pups home alive. So he pulled off liis drawers, tied 
up the legs and put his three black prisoners into them. 
They fought some, and sometimes they bit him; but he 
slung them over his shoulder and toted them home. He 
kept them about the house until they grew so large that 
they bit the children and were continualh' doing acts of 
violence. Then he made a stout cage and kept them in it. 
This cage is still to be seen in William Losh, Jr.'s barn. 
The bears were kept there awhile, and finally they broke 
out and ran off; but, one was shot. 

This experience did not satisfy the ronuintic liunter. He 
again went to Canada and built bear-pens. Soon he cap- 
tured a bear, half-grown. He resolved to take it home, ten 
miles through the woods and over mountains. It was too 

8 



i ■ 



; 



II 



111 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

heavy iiiul fought too much for him to carry it. He tied it 
by a short rope to the end of a loug pole, and led and 
pushed and coaxed and drove it till he got it home. When 
it wouhl get m.ul and try to hite him, he would hold it oft jj 
Avith the pole. Thus, he got it home and put it in his cage ; 
but, it ^vas so wild and incorrigible that it could not be 
tamed. 

Losh next made a new departure. He made him a com- 
plete suit of clothes from dressed bear skins, the fur outside. 
Thus dressed, he went to Baltimore. From his own ac- 
cor.nt he must have attracted as much attention as the 
President Avould have done. 

As an adventurer, he was fearless and rash. A consid- 
eration of danger never entered into his plans. That he 
escaped unscathed from so many and so perilous under- 
takings, is marvelous. Indeed, sometimes his salvation 
seemed miraculous, as when he Avas washed over a water- 
fall in the Kanawha, and was held down and whirled over 
and over by the water that fell upon him, and only got out 
by seizing the rocks in the l)ottom and clinging to them as 
ho dragged himself from under the fall, whence he came to 
the surface just in time to save his life. 

This time, he had not voluntarily placed Jiimself in the 
almost fatal danger ; but, it would only have been in ac- 
cordance with his nature to have done so. For, once when 
Cheat River was overflowing its banks, and nearly all the 
bottom landsfrom hill to hill were under Avater, he Avas in 
the Horse Shoe and Avanted to go home. To do so he must 
cross the river. With a good canoe, the crossing of the 
river would have been excc^edijigly dangerous, and proba- 
bly not another man in the county, except in a case of life 
and deatl), would have undertaken it. But Losh was de- 



MISCELLANIES. 115 

termined to cross. The only canoe at liand Avas AVm. E. 
Parsons' and the OAvner woukl not let Losh have it, because, 
by so doing, it would seem that he was only hurrying the 
rash man to his doom. But the want of a canoe did not 
serve to change Losh's determination to cross the river. 

He proceeded to the river, at Neville's Ford, and pidled 
three or four rails and slabs from a drift, and tying them 
together, made of them a raft on which he proposed to 
cross the river. It would scarcely- bear his weight in still 
water. But, nothing daunted, he pushed his fragile craft 
from the shore and was instantly borne off down the foam- 
ing torrent of the river. Apiece of board was all he had 
for an oar; and with it he rowed the best he could for the 
opposite side of the stream. The river was some three or 
four hundred feet wide exclusive of the overflowed lands on 
either side. The raft was so nearly sunken that those who 
saw Losh could see him oidy from his waist upward, and 
could not discern that he was riding on anything but water. 
But, all the time, he was rowing and made some progress 
toward the desired bank. When he reached the Turn Hole, 
where, at the mouth of Coburn Biun, the river turns to flovv' 
nortliAvard and then Avestward, the current beat strong to 
the eastern shore ; and, taking advantage of this, he was 
able to come to shore. There is recorded only one instance 
Avherein the river has ever been crossed Avhen so high. That 
was during the Avar, and Avas done in a canoe by "William 
Harper, brother to Dr. E. Harper, to escape from a band 
of guerrillas that Avere after him. 

Daring as this feat of John Losh's Avas, he equaled it on' 
other occasions. He Avas a capital SAvimmer and relied on 
his skill in manv dangerous adventures. When he Avas 
coming up from St. George, he found that Horse Shoe Eun 



IK) HISTOEY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

was over its bjiiiks. This stream is more dangerous than 
the river. It is swifter, and the numerous drifts and un- 
dermined banks make it a formidable flood when deep. He 
took off his outer clothing, hid it in a waste house and 
phmged into the stream that ran with a velocity of more 
than fifteen miles an hour. He crossed it safely, although 
the chances were ten to one against him. The run when so 
liigli, has been swum twice since. Once by James Hebb, in 
1876, to win a bet of fifty cents. He swam it twice for good 
measure, and was satisfied with the money thus won. 

After the stormy adventures and romantic wanderings of 
his earlier life had spent their novelty, John Losh settled 
down to married life in Marion County, and was living 
there when the Civil War came on. He was a Union man, 
which was different from the majority of his relations. As 
a scout and a guerrilla leader, he would probably have be- 
come noted, had not his death ended the whole matter. 
He died of the small-pox at Parkersburg early in the war. 
His widow and children still live at Urbana, Ohio. 

Among the old residents who helped to shape the desti- 
nies of the county, may be mentioned Job Parsons, Sr., 
Nathan, Enoch and Adam Miuear, Thomas and D. C. Adams, 
and the Cloffs and Fanslers of Black Fork. All these, and 
others, have lent their influence on the past and present of 
our county. Job Parsons was a soldier of the War of 1812, 
through which he served with honor. He held the office of 
Magistrate for many years, and was always a citizen of the 
county. He died in 1883 at the age of ninety-four. We 
shall find him prominently forward again during the Civil 
War, in which he sympathized with the South, and was 
never slow in expressing his sympathy. 

The Minears, during the early part of the present century, 



I 



MISCELLANIES. 117 

were principally noted as leaders in internal improvements. 
None were more forward than tbey in settling up tlie coun- 
try and finding means to develop intrinsic wealth, and of 
bringing outside wealth to our county. A mere outline of 
the sub-divisions of John Minear's family will show to what 
extent they pushed their farming interests ; and wherever 
they went they were always respected citizens. 

David Minear, son of John Minear, died at St. George in 
1834, in the seventy-ninth year of his age. He left nine 
children, who, some later and some earlier, began to emi- 
grate to different parts of West Virginia and to other 
states. Manassa, as already narrated, created a romance in 
his earlier da^s by eloping with Lyda Holbert. His son, 
T\^illiam, went to Ohio when a young man, and his descend- 
ants are still living there. David Minear's daughter Nancy 
married Rodham Bonnifield, a brother to Dr. Arnold Bon- 
nifield. They went to Illinois, and raised a family that has 
exerted and still exerts a wide influence for good. One of 
their sons, McKensie, is now a brilliant lawyer in Nevada ; 
while "William, another son, is a resident of Colorado, and 
has held many offices of trust and honor. Allen, Gregory, 
Ellis and "W. B. Bonnifield are other sons of Eodham Bon- 
nifield. Three of them made Iowa their home ; but Ellis is 
a farmer at Beloit, Kansas. Gregory is also a farmer. 
Allen is dead, but vras Sheriff, and Clerk of the circuit 
court. W. B. Bonnifield, an educated man, possessing fine 
literary abilities, is connex3ted with the First National Bank 
of Ottumwa, Iowa. Samuel, a seventh son, is a cattle king 
in the far West, and one of his sons is a lawyer and another 
is a judge. 

Nathan Minear, second son of David Minear, married the 
widow of Gregory Bonnifield. Their children, for the most 



118 HISTOKY OF TUCKEll COUNTY. 

part, (lid not j;o far from St. George. Emily married Dr. 
Call, Sirena luarried Theodore Lipscomb and Elizabeth 
married S. W. Bowman, late Sheriff of Tucker Count}'. 
Another, Mary, married Frank Tolbott, and lives in Iowa, 
while Katie married Samuel Woodring. 

William, one of David Minear's sons, lived in Harrison 
County, West Virginia. Adam Minear, Sr., brother to 
David Miner, Sr., made his home on the Valley River, in 
Barbour County; and, his family became connected with 
the Woodfords of that county, through the marriage of a 
daughter of his with John Woodford. The Woodfords are 
well known throughout West Virginia as cattle dealers. 
Harvey, Isaac and Adam live in Barbour County, and Asa in 
Lewis Count}', of which he was recently Sheriff. Hon. 
Eeuben Davisson, for many years Sheriff of Taj'lor County 
and often its representative in the Legislature, is also a de- 
scendant of the Minears. 

One of David Minear's sons Avas drowned in the Hock 
Hocking River, in Ohio. Enoch and Nelson Marsh, noAV of 
Florida, are grandsons of Sarah Minear, David Minear's 
daughter. Of his other children, Mary married William 
Miller and Elizabeth, Dr. Arnold Bonnifield, 

David Minear had a sister Avho married Xinirod Haddix. 
He took delight in jumping into the mill-pond to scare his 
wife, who never failed to become alarmed and to try to pidl 
him out. But, he carried his s})ort too far, inasmuch as he 
came down head first, and striking the bottom Avith great 
violence, he broke his neck. 

The immediate family of Enoch Minear, son of David 
Minear, might have done much for Tucker County, had 
they staid in it. But, they were dissatisfied, and one by 
one departed for the West, until David was the only one, 



MISCELLANIES. 119 

of a family of ten, left in the county. He cliose the occu- 
pation of a merchant, and, for a few years, was the leadinj^ 
store-keeper of St. George. But he abandoned this busi- 
ness, and devoted himself wholly to farming and stock- 
raising. His farm is the one taken up by his great grand- 
father, John Minear, in 177G, and lies immediately below 
St. George, on the north side of the river. It is a fine, 
valuable and highly improved piece of property. Of Enoch 
Minear's ten children, seven went to California. Adam C 
Minear, the youngest, subsequently returned, and is now 
Sheriff of Tucker County. He traveled extensively through 
the West, and was for a long time in Idalio. John, Pool 
and Mary are still in Idaho, Mar}- having married C. W. 
Moore, a banker of Boise Cit}'. John's wife was an educa- 
ted lady who had been a missionary in Japan. Pool has 
l.ieen in the mining and railroad business in California and 
Idalio for many 3-ears. He was once president of a Florida 
railroad. He is now in Idaho. 

Some of the members of this family shall be mentioned 
more at length in other parts of this book. As said, if they 
had staid in Tucker County, they might have exerted a veiy 
controlling influence u])on its affairs ; for, they are men of 
energy ; and, Avherever they have been, they have l)een in 
the front of advancement. Enoch Minear still resides in 
St. George and is its oldest citizen. He has been twice 
married. 

About 1816, Ambrose Lipscomb, an old soldier of the 
Pievolution, settled on the river, near the Preston County 
line. His descendants are now numerous in the county, and 
are all noted for great ]ihysical strength. 

Adam Harper, father of Dr. E. Harper, came to Clover 
Iiun, from Pendleton Countv, in an early day. He lived to 



i 



12U 



HI8T0EY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 



au okl a<j;e, aiul his fuinily, tlioiigli scattered far and Avide, 
Lave ahva^'s possessed wonderful energy. Difficulties 
and obstacles liave been forced to jield before tlieni in 
ivliatever direction they tnrned their hands. His sons have 
been great trayelors. One died on the Eockj Monntains, 
another at Santa Barbara, California, one still lives on the 
Pacific Coast, and another. Dr. Harper, nov»- lives in Tucker. 
Of all of them, and particularly of the last, fuller mention 
^^'ill be mnde in this book. 



CHAPTER V. 

FOPcMATION OF TUCKEn COUyTT. 

Tucker County, "West Virginia, -was formed from Eaii- 
clolpli County, March 6, 1856. The people had long felt 
the inconvenience of going so far to court, as Beverly was 
then the seat of justice. From the " Biography of Abe 
Bonuiheld "■•" the following is taken : 

Tucker County was, a few years ago, the nortliern end of Ran- 
dolph County; and llandolph was originally a part of Harrison, 
and Harrison was a part of the great county of Augusta, which 
when first organized, included nearly all of West Virginia. It has 
been divided and sub-divided. County after county was struck 
off, till thirty or more counties have been formed out of the orig-- 
inal territory, llandolph County was organized in 1810. It was a 
large couLty, some seventy-five miles long, and the settlements 
were separated by large tracts of woods, and the roads connecting 
them were none too good. Thus it came to pass that, for many 
years, the people of the northern part, now Tucker County, greAV 
dissatisfied that they had to go so far to attend court, which was 
held at Beverly, then the county-seat. The subject of a new 
county, to be taken from the northern end of Randolph, was re- 
peatedly agitated ; but no decisive step was taken, till in the win- 
ter of 1854, when a general meeting was called at the residence of 
Enoch Minear, in the old Stone House at St. George. t 

A committee of some fifteen or twenty persons was chosen to 
select a site for a court-house for the contemplated new county. 
The committee selected a spot on Enoch Minear's farm, where the 
court-house was afterwards built. Petitions Avith numerous sig)ia- 
tures, praying for a new county were sent to the Legislature at 



*Tlie iDiogrnpliy of Alje Bonniflekl, from wliich tlie above is taken, lias never Ijeen 
publisheil. It was written toy Prof. G. B. Selby, near thirty years ag'o. It will prob- 
ably be publlslied shortly, as preparations are making- for that imrpose. 

t St. George was then called ^^'esternfora. 



122 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

Richmoml. In the -winter of 1855^6 Dr. Bo^^^vorth was tlie Dele- 
{,'ate from llandolph; and, in addition to his influence, the inhabi- 
tants of the intended new county, chose Mr. William Ewin as a 
Lobby Member to the Legislatnre. He labored with i)erseverence 
and skill, and succeeded in obtaininj;^ an Act of the Lej^islature 
for organiziuf^ the new county, with the Seat of Justice on the site 
selected by the committee above referred to. The court was or- 
fe'anized in the following July, but, owing to several deficiencies, it 
was attended with nuich difficulty. The new county was christ- 
ened Tinker, and the Seat of Justice St. (Uor<jc. Both names are, 
I l)elieve. in honor of the Clerk of the Senate of Virginia.* 
***** 
Tucker County chose its officers in ^May, ISoG. At this election 
my father-*- was elected Clerk of the circuit and county courts; 
])aniel C. Adams was electetl county connnissioner.t llufus Max- 
well, commonwealth's attoriiey, Jesse Parsons, sheriff, and Solo- 
mon Boner, county surveyor. Thus Tucker County was fairly 
set on foot; and, with becoming (Uguity as well as becoming mod- 
esty, she took her stand as one among the one hundred and fifty 
similar divisions of the Old Dominion. 

Ill tlie se.ssioii of the Yirgiuia Legislature of 18oo-1856, 
Major x\. G. Reger was our Senator aiul Dr. BosAVortli was 
our Delegate. There -were some fears eiitertaiued of failure 
in getting an act for the new county, as there -were at that 
time two other new counties pressing their claims for for- 
mation. >j Dr. Bosworth was a friend to the new county of 
Tucker, hut he was not a wire-worker and a driving man at 
such work, and remained too much silent when our county's 
interests were at stake. It was with a knowledge of this 
that William Ewin had been sent l)y our people to look 
after our interests ; for it was known that he would leave 
nothing undone to secure success. 

There Avas also another man in the A^irginia Legislature 

• This Is Incorrect, as to the county's name. t Arnold Bonnltlelil. 

i Assessor. § Calhoun and Itoane. 



FORMATION OF THE COUNTY. 123 

at that time to whom we owe much of our success. This 
man Avas .Judf^e John Brannon, of Lewis County. He was 
tlien a member of the Legislature, and entered witli enthu- 
siasm into our cause. He was a young man of rare ability 
and ambition, and his labors were not confined to the 
interests of his own county. Possessed of the soundest 
political views, his object was the building up of his State, 
and his ambition was ever to be foremost in the Avork of ad- 
vancement and improvement, no matter whether in his own 
county or in some other county. In the Legislature, he 
was respected by all, and was looked upon as a more scien- 
tific statesman than many of his colleagues, although they 
were older in ^-ears than he. His opinion had Aveight, 
because all knew that his opinion Avas not a mere collection 
of ideas. 

So, when the subject of the formation of a neAv county, 
noAv Tucker, came before the Legislature, none Avere more 
prompt to look into the merits of the case, and see that 
there Avas reason and justice in Avhat Avas asked. This Avas 
enough to secure his aid ; and, from that hour, he Avorked 
unceasingly, in common with Mr. Ewin, for tlie county. 
Senator Ewin, in speaking of Judge Brannon, in this con- 
nection, says that the bill for the ncAv county " was success- 
fully carried through upon his motion at every stage of its 
progress."" 

Major Reger, on account of sickness, AA-as forced to be 

absent from the Legislature while the bill for the ncAV 

county was before it ; but, he did all he could for us. Of 

him Senator Eaa'Iu speaks : 

It is but just to say that Major Reger, although prostrate on a 
sick bed at the time the bill was sent to the Senate, was a Avarwi 



* See Tucker Counfy Ploueer, May 28, 1«80. 



124 HI8T0EY OF TUCKEIl COUKTY. 

friend to the hill, ami expressed great regret at his forced absence. 
He did all he could under the circumstances, by dictating notes to 
a number of the most influential Senators, requesting their favor- 
able attention to the bill, which Avere kindly responded to as the 
sequel proved. 

Upon the motion of Judge Brannon tlie new coiinty was 
named Tucker in honor of Judge Tucker, and the county- 
seat St. George in honor of St. George Tucker, the Clerk, at 
that time, of the Virginia House of Delegates. Thus, in 
brief, is a histor}^ of the county of Tucker. It is now larger 
than it then was, having been increased in size by a strip 
from Barbour."" 

* In this, as -well as other subjects of our county's early histoi-y, I am indebted to 
^ViIll^ra Ewin, Jacob Dunilre, D. K. Dumlre, Closes Phillips, E. Harper, S. E. Tarsous 
and others. 



CHAPTER VI. 
SCHOOLS AND CJIUJICIIES. 

That system of training and developing tlie mind of the 
young, which calls out the hidden force of the intellect, has 
not been neglected in Tucker County, although the unfavor- 
able circumstances under which we have been placed have 
tended to keep us from advancing in the most rapid man- 
ner. A few years ago, the influence of the public schools 
could hardly be felt among our mountains. The few and 
feeble efforts that were made were done in the purest pur- 
pose, and were in all things sincere ; but so few and so in- 
efifectual were they, that they passed out upon the wide, 
wild country, and when the work was done and the whole 
sum was placed together, the result for good was hardly to 
be seen. 

" Rome was not built in a daj /' as lias been truthfidly 
said. Sometimes it seems that tremendous results are ac- 
complished almost instantly ; but, in reality, it has required 
time. So it is and must be with the work of education and 
of the Churches. They act slowly, and ofttimes it is hard 
to see wherein they advance at all ; but still they go forward 
and do well what is done, and it is never to be done again. 
The giant oak that endures for centuries, grows so slowly 
that almost the lifetime of a man is required to notice that 
it has grown at all. But, it has grown, and its growth has 
been durable. No suddenness of expansion has left flaws 
that storms can find. Solid from centre to circumference, 
it stands a monument of strength and endurability, not to 



12G HISTOllY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

be overtlaown by^ opposing force, altliongli at times to be 
shaken by tlie Aviiids and storms. But such opposition only 
makes it take dee])er root, and stand more firmly than ever. 

80, in a figurative sense, it has been with the religious 
and educational development of our county. Surely there 
has been no sudden or abnormal greatness taken place. 
Passion and excitement have not done a work ; or, if they 
have, the work has passed HM-aj and ceased to exist, as it 
should do, and as it could not but do. The growth has 
been permanent in every particular; and, though slow 
enough to discourage the impatient, yet it has been sure 
enough to satisfy the hopeful and far-seeing. 

The common schools and the churches should not be 
classed as institutions of the same kind; nor, can it be 
maintained that they stand upon the same or similar foun- 
dations ; yet, so intimately are they related, and so broadly 
does each rest upon the wideness of public enlightenment 
and national and social excellence that both may be con- 
sidered resting u]:)on the same basis. Or, exactly the oppo- 
site ground in logic, but in reality the same, may be taken, 
and it may be held that the aforesaid wideness of public- 
enlightenment and social excellence depend upon religion 
and education. Certain is it that both exist together and 
cannot thrive apart. At least, all efforts to establish one 
without the other has, in tlie past, been a signal failure. 

Individual knowledge and even Avisdom may be gainetl by 
powerful minds, groping in the darkness of infidelit}'; but 
the force thus acquired cannot be transmitted to others. It 
lives brilliantly enough wliile vitality lasts, but vitality is 
mortal and must perish. When it dies, tlie power dies too. 
It is not like the greatness of Washington or Luther or Da- 
vid or Abraham, which, upon the dissolution of the mortal 



SCHOOLS AND CHURCHES. 127 

part, -went out into elements bej-oncl to live on. Nations, 
uneducated and grossh- superstitious, cannot be what tliose 
are wliicli are thrilled, filled and animated by that higher, 
nobler and purer doctrine, which we knoAv to be good, as we 
know that light is beautiful. Africa and England are not 
the same. England is l)etter than Africa. We know such 
to be so. 

The mysteries of philosoph}' and chemistry are not more 
recondite than is that of the change Avhich knowledge causes 
to take place in the individual man, and more so in the col- 
lective man or the community. It is undefinable, but is 
needing no definition. It acts and permeates through na- 
ture and characteristics until all are changed into conformity 
with a new order. 

Public education in Tucker County has never reached as 
high a standard as should be. Circumstances have been 
against it. The wild and undeveloped state of the country 
lias been a powerful draAvback; but the time is now coming 
when this difficulty will be overcome. The people are thor- 
oughly in sympathy with the common school system, and it 
must enter upon a better career than its past has been. 

There is, in the count}", no means of gaining a better 
education than may be gained in the common schools. No 
institutions of a higher order have been established ; and, 
there would not, at this time, be sufficient supjwrt for any- 
thing of the kind. But the time cannot be far distant when 
our 3-ouths, Avho have completed the narrow bounds of our 
common school education, will not be forced to go beyond 
our borders in order to proceed further with their course of 
studies. 

The higher departments of learning must ever be the 
channel through Avliich the cfreat shall reach their i;Teat- 



128 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

ness ; but, tlie common seliools, brmgiug education for the 
masses, is the broad foundation upon whicli rests the 
national poAver of America. A great individual is a power- 
ful factor in a country's greatness ; but, a Nation's solidity 
and power is built upon those whose common worth only 
has been develo]:)ed. The leaders of such a people as the 
United States are leaders onl}^ by the consent of the gov- 
erned ; and, for the governed to know whom to appoint to 
this position, and to rectify mistakes when made, is all that 
there is in national greatness. 

Ninety-nine per cent, of those who receive high school 
educations have not the mental stability to profit by it or to 
lend profit to others ; but, of those whose training has 
been in the common schools, not one per cent, fail to fulfill 
their calling. They do not aim at the stars. They seek 
only that which they need and can find, and thus do not 
seek in vain, as many do whose learning so exalts them that, 
in their infatuation, they leave the object and grasp at tlie 
shadow. 

The higher departments of learning are exercising a pow- 
erful influence upon science, but the education of the masses 
is building the world. Aside from the Churches and their 
associations, there is nothing better or greater tlian the 
schools where the poor man's boy can gain that knowledge 
wliich will give him control over the hardest problems of 
life. The rich can command the means of ac(piiring this, 
but the poor cannot, unaided b}' the public. 

In Tucker County the improvement from year to year 
has been marked ; and now it is so that our schools, or 
at least, our county, is able to provide teachers at homo 
for the seliools. The custom of employing teachers from 
other counties is not without objection. Sometimes it is 



SCHOOLS AND CHUECHES. 129 

necessary to do so, when tlie home supply falls short of the 
demand. But it is best to have the schools of the county 
conducted by those who take a deeper interest in them than 
merely to get the salary. A teacher who comes from an- 
other county is usually one that is unable to get emploj'ment 
at home, and is, consequently, unfit for employment abroad. 
Of course, there are exceptions, and many exceptions ; but 
still it is generally the case that a teacher worth anything, 
settles down to work where he is known. If a county is 
much overrun by outside teachers, it is a sign that it either 
has not home talent sufficient to conduct its own schools, or 
that it pays a higher salary than its neighbors and that the 
teachers are gathered in to share in the advanced prosperity. 
From the rude log huts, wherein the people one hundred 
years ago congregated to worship, we have advanced stead- 
ily until our churches present a favorable contrast with the 
rest of our improvements. They are sufficient for the ac- 
commodation of all who come together to worship. The 
religious doctrine of the mass of our people has undergone 
no material change in the last one hundred years. The 
creed of the Methodist ^Church is the prevailing one here. 
The Presbyterians, Dunkards, Baptists, Lutherans, Catho- 
lics and Campbellites have a few representatives. The 
Methodists are pretty evenly divided into three classes, 
North and South and Protestant Methodists. The Presby- 
terians are of the Southern branch oj that Church. The 
Dunkards are identical with the German Baptists. Their 
members are tolerably numerous, but they have no church 
in the county. They preach in the houses of other denom- 
inations. Neither have the Baptists, Lutherans, Camp- 
bellites or Catholics any church. There are, at this time, 
only two Catholics in the county. 

9 



CHAPTER VII. 
MOUNTAINS AND CA YES. 

The mountains of Tucker possess an interest for tlie 
people of Tucker, although nothing special to the people of 
the outside world. On our south-eastern border the great 
comb of the Appalachian range extends like a barrier. 
This, the Alleghany ridge, is the highest mountain in our 
county, and the highest point is eastward from the upper 
end of the Canaan Valley, about the meeting of the drain- 
age of New Creek and Eed Creek. The rain that falls on 
the summits of these ridges finds its way to the ocean, 
either the Atlantic, through the Potomac, or the Gulf of 
Mexico, through the Mississippi and its tributaries. 

The Backbone is a spur of the Alleghanies, and is nearly 
as high. It diverges from the Alleghanies at Fairfax and 
trends to the north and west of Canaan. This mountain is 
almost as rough as the main Alleghany. No farming of 
much importance is done on it. 

The rest of the mountains are broken up, and extend in 
any and every direction without system. Shafer's Mountain, 
Green Mountain and others have some regularity in exten- 
sion ; and on the west Laurel Hill extends unbroken. It 
divides the waters of Cheat Eiver from those of the East 
Fork. No streams break through it, as through the Back- 
bone. It is not so high as the Alleghany or the Backbone 
Mountain. 

Among the mountains of TiTcker, the most interesting is 
Limestone, standing a solitary remnant of an earlier gcolog- 



MOUNTAINS AND CAYES. 131 

ical age, when the flowing waters had not carried away the 
high plains that then extended, ragged no doubt, from the 
top of Limestone to the Backbone. Ages, centuries and 
millennials of storms and floods have wrought their work of 
ruin, and the torrents of winter, together with the cleaving 
frosts and the dashing rains, have carried away the moun- 
tains, and the high plain exists only in its north and south 
edges — the Backbone and Limestone. All the intervening 
plateau has been washed away, and probably now goes to 
make up the plains of Mississippi and Louisiana, whither 
the rivers have carried the debris. 

The following is condensed from the Clarkdturg Heguter, 
where it was published some thirty years ago : 

LIMESTONE MOUNTAIN.* 

This luountain is an isolated hill, rising abruptly from the western 
bank of Cheat River, in Tucker County, and extends in a course 
nearly north and south. The length of the mountain at its base is 
about three miles, that of its summit less than two. Its width at 
its base is something more than two miles, at its top from one- 
fourth to three fourths of a mile. Its greatest height is about two 
thousand seven hundred feet above the river, t It receives its name 
from the abundance of blue limestone that protrudes from the 
surface of the ground. The western declivity is exceedingly steep 
and rough, abounding in rocks as large as houses, while the eastern 
slope is gentle and gradual, and, for the most part, is covered with 
beautiful grazing farms. 

The grass of the mountain is of a superior quality, and is not 
surpassed by any in the country. The soil around the slope, and 
even to the suuuuit, is exceedingly fertile, and produces vegetation 
in the greatest luxurience ; and, every part that has not been 
cleared abounds in forests of excellent timber. The different kinds 
of oak, ash, chestnut, black and white walnut, sugar, white mai:)le 
and hickory abound in almost every part. Nearly the whole 

*lt Is supposed that this article was written by Professor Seiby, a scliool teacher who 
lived at Limestone many years ago. 
tThis is an overestimation. 



132 HISTOEY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

mountain, together with a large tract on the eastern side, is owned 
by William Ewin, Esq., an intelligent, wealthy and enterprising 
gentleman living in Tucker County, who is now converting the 
whole into an extensive grazing farm.* A considerable number of 
cattle and sheep have for several years been kept on it. When the 
whole is put under improvement, a more beautiful prospect of 
rural scenery will probably nowhere exist. 

The sumuiit of the mountain extends in a direct line, except that 
it falls about two hundred feet not far from the northern end, form- 
ing a most romantic plateau of level land. Then rising again, it 
continues one unbroken course to its southern extremity. At the 
northern end there are several high and rocky peaks that overlook 
the surrounding country to a vast extent. The prospect from 
these points, especially in the summer season, is grand and beau- 
tiful in the extreme. The spectator appears to be elevated in the 
blue firmament, far above the tops of ten thousand beautiful hills, 
that seem to roll in undulations as far as the eye can reach ; while 
the meandering river shimmers with its bright waters far down 
below. On this pi-ospect the eye dwells with a rapture that 
must be enjoyed and wondered at before it can be understood. 
Then passing southAvard along the brow of the mountain, you 
soon descend to the table land, above alluded to. This delightful 
tract of level land on the top of the mountain would at once arrest 
the attention of the observer. The soil is a darkish loam, in some 
places niingled with gravel, well adapted to the production of 
grain. It is shaded with groves of chestnut, hickory and sugar 
maple, and covers ahnost seventy acres. 

Leaving this, in a southern course, you climb a steep ascent, Avhich 
leads to the principal summit of the mountain. As you pass along 
this part of the mountain you will observe trees deeply scathed by 
lightning, affording unmistakable proof that the god of thunder 
has rolled his fiery car over the mountain. 

From this ridge, far on the left, beyond a thousand rolling hills, 
you behold the principal ridge of the Alleghanies looming up as if 
to gaze on the surrounding world. The eye may trace the course 
of this ridge, broken by deep chasms and rounding summits, near 

• Senator Ewin stUl owns tWs land, as lie did thirty years ago. 



MOUNTAINS AND CAVES. 133 

one hundred miles.* Toward the extremity of the vision the 
mountains appear as if rolling in the distant waves of the blue 
ether, and farther off they entirely disappear. Sometimes, of 
course, from this elevation may be seen the black clouds of storms 
hovering over the distant mountains. The loud rumbling of thun- 
der may be heard, and the vivid flashes of lightning, darting from 
cloud to cloud, may be seen. On such an occasion, the view is 
awfully sublime. What a scene for contemplation ! The mind of 
the spectator, oppressed with a load of insupportable glory, invol- 
untarily falls back upon its own insignificance and shrinks into 
nothingness before the astounding display of Almighty Power. 

Approaching the southern part of the mountain and turning 
some distance to the right, there is a beautiful plateau of level 
land, perhaps one hundred acres or more. Here Nature appears 
to have reveled in the gratification of her own fancy, and formed 
a little detached world, purely her ov>^n. The soil exhibits great 
fertility, and is shaded by delightful groves of sugar, thinly 
mingled with hickory and black walnut. Here are excellent springs 
of pure water, gurgling from the rocks, and rolling over beds of 
white gravel, or flowing beneath the shade of giant rocks which 
overhang the course. Here are detached masses of rounded, gray 
rocks, peering above the surface, and looking, from a distance, like 
enormous elephants sleeping in the green shade. 

About half mile from this place, in a south-western covirse, is a 
large pile of huge rocks that entirely cover the surface of the earth 
for a number of acres. This rocky pile exhibits all the wildness 
that the imagination could desire. It is bounded on the south by 
a stupendous pile of massive bowlders, some of which are as large 
astemjjles, and form frightful precipices. 

This pile of enormous rocks forms the south-western bend of the 
mountain, and to a contemplative eye is equal in interest to any 
other part. A scene of greater wildness, grandeur and sublimity 
is not easily found. Here is everything to arouse the deep feelings 
of the soul and drive it to profound meditation. The spectator, 
seated upon these enormous rocks, while the rays of the burning 
sun are reflected from their flinty sides, in mind involuntarily runs 

* Tliis, again, is an overestimatlon. Tlie day must be exceedingly clear, In Tucker 
County, 11 a mountain can he seen Iwty miles. 



134 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

into a channel of s^erious andmelanclioly contemplations, while far 
around, the glory of Natui-e's works crowd themselves upon the 
astonished vision. These huge, eternal rocks, covered with moss, 
and grown gray with the flood of years, still repose in silence. 

Though the stormy winds of heaven have battled against them 
for thousands and thousands of years, yet they sleep on. Torna- 
does have rushed with ruin round, but these everlasting hills of 
nature, secure in their own immutable strength, regarded them 
not. Seasons have rolled and time has fled, but they remain un- 
moved, and seem to mock at the perishing glory of the world. 
Monarchies have shaken the earth with the footsteps of their 
power, and deluged it with blood, and, sunk away in their own 
weakness and expired. Nations have arisen to greatness and 
glory and then relapsed into eternal silence. But, these mighty 
monuments of power, as if conscious of their own immutability, 
regarded not the changing world around them. But, though they 
sleep in silence, yet they are not ineloquent. Though they speak 
not audiblj^ yet they have a language that cannot be misunder- 
stood. Their own eternal silence is eloquent, and their everlasting 
stillness proclaims the truth. They carry the observer far back 
through the dim vista of time to the period when they were thrown 
from the hands of their Creator. They speak eloquently of all the 
changes of succeeding ages since the beginning when God created 
the heavens and the earth. They remind us of the mighty cities 
and nations of the earth, once full of the schemes of human life, 
now sunk to rise no more. They speak mockingly of kings and 
conquerors, long since forgotten in the silence of the tomb. With 
speechless language they seem to say : " Where now are the 
mighty personages that once figured upon the stage of life, and 
produced such Avonderful commotions in the world ? Whose hand 
grasped the sword of power, and the nations trembled before 
them ? Every tongue was elofjuent in their praise, and every hand 
ministered unto them. Yet they are gone with the swift revolving 
years, and their places are filled by others perishable, or vacant 
forever. Time has spread his dark i)avilion over them. Their 
monuments are broken down and their very tombs have decayed. 
Where now is all the greatness, the pride and the glory of by-gone 
generations ? They once lived, they flourished, and the pleasures 



MOUNTAINS AND CAYES. 135 

of life were sweet to them. But, all is fjone ! Death has seized 
upon them, and their greatness has vanished away, their pride has 
fallen, and their glory has departed forever." / 

So speak the dead rocks, dead but eternal in their works, and 
while they are eloquent in their allusions to the faded glories of 
the past, they also deliver us a solemn lecture on the shoi-tness of 
our own earthly existence. They remind us that, in a few more 
days, the sun that shines so brightly upon the graves of past gen- 
erations, will shine with equal brightness upon ours. They ad- 
monish us that, in a few more years, the present generations, w^ith 
all their boasted wisdom, will sink into the silence of the tomb; 
and, with all who have gone before them, they, too, will be for- 
gotton. And with the same noiseless, solemn eloquence we are re- 
minded of the time when the "ancient of days shall appear, whose 
throne is like the fiery flame and his wheels are burning fire." 
"When the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the 
elements shall melt with fervent heat." " When the earth and all 
the works that are therein shall be burned up." They seem to say: 
"Proud man, thy tabernacle is built of clay! thy body is flesh; 
therefore, thou shalt not endure. Thy days on earth are a hand's 
breadth, and thy life but a span. Though the fondness of life be 
great, and the love of pleasure deeply fixed in thy soul, yet thy 
stay on earth is transient as the morning cloud, evanescent as the 
early dew that continueth not." They, likewise, point to the time 
when they themselves, after they have stood in the majesty of 
their strength for thousands of years, shall be dissolved by the 
burning flame, and into smoke shall they vanish away. 

Scores of mountains of Tucker have names given tliem Ijy 
local occurrences, or in way of distinction. Among these 
are Old AjuJra, named, it is said, from a man of that name 
who used to follow wagoning along the road that passes 
over it. One very cold night, while traveling the road, lie 
missed some article from his load, and w^ent back to hunt 
it, leaving his son, a small boy, in the wagon. He had fur- 
ther to go than he anticipated, and upon his return, found 
his boy frozen to death. The circumstance was applied in 



136 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

desiguatiug tlie place, and finally the mountain came to be 
knoAvn as Old Andra, a name ever since retained by it. The 
mountain is about seven miles from St. George, on the road 
to Aurora. 

fSij/hs' Kiu)l> was named from Bernard Sims, avIio used to 
live at its base, and Avho was killed by the Indians. Zi/j>6- 
eomJ/s J?i(Jfje receives its name from the Lipscomb family, 
who settled there in ;in early day. Class Mountain was 
named from David Closs, a Scotchman who bought the 
mountain many years ago, and still lives there. 8hafer''s 
Mountain was named from Shafer's Fork, and Green Moun- 
tain, from its verdure in summer. Pifer Moxintain was 
named from Andrew Pifer. ITog Bad', on the waters of 
Horse Shoe Run, is so named from its resemblance to a 
hog's back. Location Ridge is so called because the loca- 
tion for a turnpike is there. Miller Ilill, four miles below, 
St. George, on the road to Rowlesburg, is named from Wil- 
liam Miller. 

If the subterranean vronders of Tucker County were bet- 
ter known, it would rank among the first counties of the 
state in that respect. No caves as extensive as Mammoth, 
of Kcntueln', or Luray, of Yirginia, have been discovered. 
Rut there are natural wonders of this kind, some explored 
and others almost unknovrn. They are found in the lime- 
stone formation. 

Falling Sjyring. — On the Dry Fork road, some fifteen 
miles from St. George, is a natural curiosity, called Falling 
S]:)ring. Just above the road, where a little mountain stream 
falls over a cataract, is an opening in the limestone rock, in 
an oblong shape, about thirt}' feet deep, into which the 
water falls as spra}'. There is no account that the pit has 
ever l)een descended into. Yiewing it from the top, it looks 



MOUNTAINS AND CAVES. 137 

as tliougli from its bottom a cave may extend back into the 
mountain. Probably it will some time be explored, and 
then its true nature and extent can be known. 

Jordmis Cave. — On tlie other side of the river, almost 
opposite Falling Spring, is a large cavern called Jordan's 
Cave. We quote the following from the Biography of Abe 
Bonnifield : 

On the west side of Dry Foi-k there is a cave, frequently called 
Jordan's Cave. This name is given on account of an ignorant 
fellow of that name who discovered it, and who pretended to have 
remained there a considerable time and to have made many dis- 
coveries in it. He wrote a hook descriptive of it,* and claimed to 
uiake known to the world many wonderful things. Jordan's book 
is as destitute of elegance and correct composition as the narrative 
which it contains is of truth. It would be but justice to his pam- 
phlet to say that for falsehood, nonsense and absvirdity it has few 
equals and no superiors. Reports say that Jordan has since gone 

crazj^ 

Mr. Penn, who was with Jordan, says that the cave is, indeed, a 
wonderful place, and thinks that they must have traveled several 
miles under ground, t He says that there appeared to be many 
different apartments. Probablj' there is room here for much 
further research, which would richly repay the geological visitor 
for his pains. 

The more recent explorations of Jordan's cave have more 
and more confirmed Jordan's account of it, as it is remem- 
bered by those who have read his book. The cave is a suc- 
cession of halls and rooms, one beyond the other, through 
all of which flows a stream of clear, cold water. 

Blovnng Cave, at the head of Elk Creek, is more of a cu- 
riosity than Jordan's Cave is, although not so extensive. 
It is called Blowing Cave, because in warm weather a strong 

* This book cannot now be found. 

t The cave has since been explored by Ruf us Maxwell, Dr. William Ewin, David and 
A. T. Bonnifleld, and they found it less than half a mile in extent. 



138 HISTORY OF TUCKEE COUNTY. 

current of cold air flows from it, and is sufficiently cool to 
chill one who remains in it a few minutes. This cave has 
been explored to the distance of nine hundred feet, and is, 
also, a succession of chambers and rooms, some of w^hich 
are fantastic and beautiful. 

There are numerous other caves and caverns in the 
county, some of which have been only partly explored. On 
Limestone Mountain there is a cave said to be very exten- 
sive. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

LUMBER INTERESTS OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

Nature bestowed upon Tucker County a splendid growth 
of timber. When the old pioneers first visited the bottom 
lands along the river, they found there the most gigantic 
oaks, hickories, walnuts and other timbers. No woodsman's 
ax had ever broken in on the solemn reign of these primeval 
kings. Perhaps, near some beautiful spring, or on the 
shaded bank of some mountain stream, the roaming Indian 
had paused long enough in his pursuit of game to hack, 
with his flinty hatchet, a few trees, or he may have stripped 
them of their bark, with which to erect him a shelter against 
the rains of the verdant summer or the snows that come in 
the winter time. Or, some savage, in the desire of his heart 
to lift himself out of the dark depths of wildness and bru- 
tality, may have cleared away, with hatchet and fire, the 
trees and rubbish from some fertile acre, and there built for 
himself a better wigwam than that of his more savage 
neighbor ; and, on the little plantation of his own clearing, 
there may have grown by his rude cultivation a few square 
rods of grain or vegetables. But such an Indian, if he ex- 
isted, had more than mere forest or sultry summers or icy 
winters against which to contend in his struggle to grow 
better and to foster the germ of civilization which he felt 
rising in his soul. Nature and nature's obstacles were hard 
enough to be removed or triumphed over, and the inani- 
mate enemies to his advancement, that were all about him, 
were enemies enough ; but, they were not the worst. His 



140 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

own people, the tribes of his fellow-beings, would not rise 
to a higher grade of existence, and they would not sufier 
Mm to rise. The little field that he had cleared and tilled 
"Until it was yielding him a sustenance, was the object of his 
kindred's hatred. They raided upon it, and carried away 
or destroyed what was growing, and the owner, in his dis- 
couragement and anger, flung down his wooden hoe and his 
flinty hatchet, and declared that he would no more labor 
where no profits would ever be gained. Thus, the little 
plantation was abandoned to its original wilderness, and 
soon the brambles covered it. The brambles grew into 
trees, and again the land was an unbroken forest, and thus 
it was when the white man's foot first pressed the soil. 

There seems to have been as much timber in Tucker when 
first visited by whites, as there ever was afterwards. The 
amount that the trees grew in one hundred years, making 
large trees of small ones, was counteracted by the number 
of large ones that died and fell down in that time, so that 
the amount of marketable timber in the county diJ^not in- 
crease, and probably never would have increased, had it 
remained untouched by man forever. It is maintained by 
some that at a period not very remote, the region west of 
the Alleghanies, and among them, was treeless, as the west- 
ern prairies are. Such may have been the case, but there 
is nothing in Tucker to warrant such a conclusion. As far 
back as any account is had, the trees were as large and 
stood as thick as they do in the unmolested forests of 
to-day. Our history extends back only about one hundred 
and twenty years ; and in that time nothing has transpired 
to lead one to suppose that the general condition of our for- 
ests are undergoing a change. 

The age of some of our trees, as indicated by their an- 



LUMBEE INTEEESTS. 141 

nual rings, show that they were here before Cohimbus saw 
San Salvador. The size of a tree is little by which to judge 
its age. A sycamore one foot in diameter may be less than 
ten years old ; while another tree of the same kind and size 
may be one hundred. It depends upon where they stand, 
whether in a place suitable for growing or not. A. pine tree 
on the Fork Eidge of Pine Eun was thii-ty-nine inches in 
diameter and one hundred and nineteen years old. An oak 
tree three inches larger, cut by George Sypolt on Holbeii; 
Eun, was five hundred and sis years old, A sycamore that 
formerly stood on John H. Swisher's farm, on Horse Shoe 
Eun, was over six feet across the hollow within. Of 
course, its age could not be known, but hollow trees are 
of slow growth. A hollow sycamore in the Horse Shoe 
was said to have been ten feet across the hollow ; but, its 
exact size is not agreed upon by those who have seen it. A 
red oak that formerly stood on Horse Shoe Eun below Bon- 
nifield's, was sawed down. It was solid and over five feet 
across. Its annual rings were so thin that they could not 
be counted. There were, however, hundreds of them, and 
the tree must have been among the oldest in the county. 

It was many years after the first settlements of the county 
before its timber had any marketable value. There was no 
place where it could be sold, and it was counted as so much 
rubbish — worse than nothing where the ground must be 
cleared. The first settlers along the river were almost dis- 
coui'aged when they contemplated the time and labor that 
would be requu-ed to remove the gigantic oaks that stood 
thick all over the bottom lands. Some few of them were 
made into rails ; but, further than this, they could be put 
to no use ; and it became neccessary to destroy them with 
ax and fire. The work rec^uired years and years, and was 



142 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

completed within the memory of those still living. The 
amount of timber thus destroyed must have been immense, 
as we can judge by taking into account the extent of terri- 
tory so timbered, and the number and size of the trees. 
But, it was all destroyed before timber here had any value. 

But, gradually, as the country began to develop, rude 
saw-mills were built, and a few plank houses took the 
place of the primitive log cabins. This was the first use, 
aside from rail fences, to which lumber was put in this 
county. The demand was small, and the manufactories 
were few. 

The first call for lumber to go out of the county was that 
to build the bridge across Cheat, where the North-western 
Pike crosses, five miles above Rowlesburg. A large part of 
this lumber was sawed by Arnold Bonnifield, and after 
being hauled to the river, was built into rude rafts, and 
driven with the current to its destination. 

The kinds of timber found in Tucker, having a marketa- 
ble value, are several : pine, including several kinds, white, 
yellow, pitch, spruce and hemlock. The spruce and hem- 
lock are often confounded with each other, and what one 
calls spruce another calls hemlock. Properly, the hemlock 
does not really grow here ; but a species much like it is 
found along deep hollows, and is noticeable for its small 
leaves, from one-fourtli to three-fourth of an inch long, and 
the sixteenth of an inch wide, and for the symmetrical form 
of the tree, which grows in the form of a huge cone, taper- 
ing regularly from the first limbs to the top of the tree. 
The knots of this tree are very hard, brittle as glass, and 
Avill break an ax that is not tempered in the best manner. 
The wood has firmness and strength, but is not susceptible 
of a neat finish. It is less valuable than white pine. The 



LUMBEK INTEEESTS. 143 

grain of its wood is coarse, and breaks in a zigzag manner. 
White pine, all in all, represents and lias represented the 
greater portion of Tucker County's wealth of timber. It is 
not a fine wood ; but, is durable, neat and substantial. It 
is soft, thus being easy to work, and light, making it con- 
venient for hauling. It will receive a finish better than 
hemlock, and next to that of poplar. It is the tallest tim- 
ber in the Alleghany Mountains. 

Spruce pine, formerly called hemlock, grows on the sum- 
mits of our highest mountains, and has never yet been put 
in market to any considerable extent. Its greatest abund- 
ance is on and beyond the Backbone Mountain, in the 
Canada country. Its lowest limit of natural growth is not 
less than fifteen hundred feet above the sea, although a few 
trees may be found any altitude. The bark of the tree is 
smoother than white pine, and the trunks are very round 
and regular. The wood is harder than that of white pine. 

In value next after white pine is that of poplar. It grows 
in any locality and in any soil ; although it flourishes best 
in rich land and toward a northern exposure. The trees 
are tall, and generally carry a size nearly uniform from the 
ground to the limbs, which are usually crooked and clumsy, 
and the first ones are about two-thirds of the distance from 
the ground to the top of the tree ; and from that to the top 
they are scattered at hap-hazzards. The wood is of a yellow 
color, and is used in cheap furniture, and for building pur- 
poses. But, it is not suitable for either, when sawed into 
thin boards, because it curls and warps when it becomes 
dry. It can be dressed smoother than any pine, and pre- 
sents a harder surface, and is freer from knots. 

Cherry and walnut are the two kinds of wood best suited 
to furniture and highly finished carpenter work. They are 



144 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

next to maliogany for this purpose. Walnut is the prefer- 
able of the t"\vo, because it warps less than cherry ; but 
cherr}'- is much used, and Avhen properly worked and handled 
is excellent for tables, stands, and the finishing of doors, 
windows and rooms. The tendency of cherry to warp is 
partly compensated for in its harder quality and tough grain. 
But walnut is the better in all cabinet work that is meant 
for climates that change. No cherry should ever be used in 
organs, bureaus or geared machinery. The supply of either 
of these timbers in Tucker is limited. Walnut is found 
thinly scattered over the whole countrj^ and there is no 
particular place where it is not found ; and the same is 
partly true of cherry ; but, in Canaan, it is found most 
abundantly. 

We have in Tucker two kinds of maple. One we call 
sugar, and the other maple. Thej'- are quite different. 
The latter is often called silver maple. Both are hard 
wood, and make good wood-work of machinery. The maple 
is used for furniture, and is really nicer than either walnut 
or cherry, when properly dressed and varnished. Its wood 
is waved in the most beautiful manner, and surpasses the 
finest imitations that art can make. Knots, that in other 
woods are blemishes, are in maple desirable, because they 
produce the finest curves and undulations, that seem to ex- 
tend like waves over water, further and further until lost by 
the gradual blending into the general surface of the wood. 
Often the curves meet, coming from two knots, and, instead 
of crossing each other, as they do on water, they seem to 
check each other, and pile up, one on another, as though 
trying to pass, but unable to do so. 

Curved lines and curved motions are the most pleasing 
to the human eye ; and in nature almost everything is 



LUMBER INTERESTS. 145 

found to be in accordance with this principle. "Water moves 
in curves, trees groAv in curves, sound and light and heat, 
with few moditications, move in curves, and in the atoms 
about us, we have reason to believe that all motion is in 
other than straight lines, while we know that the planets 
move about a center. 

This truth of nature, that beauty of form is due to the 
uniform variation of lines, is seen to perfection in the for- 
mation of the wood of the maple. 

An industry of Tucker County, not of much hnancial 
value, but still of value to the people, is the making of sugar 

from the maple and sugar trees. All trees of this kind, in 

it 
the north, are called maple; but here there is a local dif- 
ference. The sugar is understood to be one thing and the 
maple another ; and the difference is as clearly defined as it 
is between any kinds of wood. Sugar is made alike from 
both. In February, March and April the trees are "tapped," 
as it is called, and the water that flows from them, after 
being retained in a trough set for the purpose, is boiled in 
kettles, and thus the sugar is made. The water from the 
maple tree is scarcely sweet to the taste ; but that from the 
sugar tree is quite sweet. Strange as it may seem, the wa- 
ter from the maple tree will pan out nearl}^ as much sugar 
as that from the sugar tree. There is a slight difference in 
the taste of the sugar ; and that made from the maple is 
browner than that from the sugar tree. The sugar season 
lasts from the middle of February to the middle of April. 

Ash, hickory and locust are the three hardest woods in 
common use. Ash is the most like iron in durability and 
strength. It is unjdelding, and in the frame-work of ma- 
chinery it is not surpassed. Hickory is tougher than ash, 
and will bend into all shapes before it will break. Its most 

10 



14G HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

usual use is for liaudles. Locust is not often emploj^etl in 
"vvood-work. It is very liard, but its hardness is not its best 
quality. As posts for fences it lasts longer than any other 
Avood. Posts of it have ])een known to last nearly' three- 
fourths of a century. On Horse Shoe Run, near its mouth, 
is a locust ]:)Ost that is believed to have been planted about 
1817. It is still sound. It was planted top down, and has 
ever since been used as a bar-post. 

When exposed to the alternate action of dry and damp, 
timber decajs much sooner than Avlien kept wet or kept 
dry all the time. Timbers under the water, aWay from the 
air, will last intinitely longer than when the air can act upon 
them, and the water, too, at the same time. The old mill- 
dam timbers at St. George are good illustrations of this. 
They Avere put in near 1770, and a few years later were 
covered several feet deep with gravel, and there they re- 
mained until 1875, when the gravel was washed off, and the 
timbers were left exposed to view. They were sound, and 
are still sound, although for nine years the}^ have been ex- 
posed to both water and air. They are of oak wood, and 
still plaiidy show the marks of the ax. They are in the 
ford of Mill Run, on Main street, St. George. 

When entirely in the dry, wood will last also a long time. 
The interior timbers of houses seem to undergo no change 
so long as they are kept entirely dry. In a cave of Grant 
County, West Virginia, is a cedar log that was carried there 
alnmt 1751, and was used as steps (notches having been cut 
in it) for getting down over a precipice, when the settlers 
fled there to escape from the Indians. The log is still 
sound ; and where the notches were cut, the marks of the 
ax, and even the paths made by dull ])laces in the ax, are as 
plainly seen as when the log was placed there. The log is 



LUMBEE INTEEESTS. 147 

cedar, of which wood Tucker County has a very Hmited 
supply. 

The mountains facing the river are covered with oak timber. 
This has been much used for rails, in past years, and is still 
used to a considerable extent. Oak in the market, com- 
mands a good price, and is now rafted down the river in 
large quantities ; but there are drawbacks in the way of 
getting it to market. It is very heavy to haul, and, when 
rafted, floats so deep that it is difficult and expensive to get 
it to the railroad. Green red-oak will not float at all. Some 
years ago Mr. N. M. Parsons cut a lot of rail timber, and 
hauled it to the bank of the river, designing to float it down 
to a suitable place for splitting it. It was placed on skid- 
ways, sloping to the water, and when all was ready, the 
prop that held the first log was knocked out and the whole 
skidfull of logs Avent rolling into the river, sank instantly 
to the bottom, and has not been seen from that day to this. 
Sycamore is also heavier than water, and will sink. It is 
a worthless, or almost worthless wood. It is coarse and 
spongy, and from this county very little of it lias ever gone 
to market. It is twisted and will not split, and when sawed 
can be used for such few purposes that it is an undeveloped 
article in our woods. It grows almost exclusively along the 
river and the larger streams flowing into it, and is seldom 
found on lands of any altitude. One tree grows on the 
head of Hansford Kun, at the old Gower Farm, and this is 
probably the most elevated tree of the kind in the county. 
On the islands in the river, and in the damp bottoms on 
both sides, the sycamore flourishes to perfection. When 
young, the tree grows tall, stately and beautiful. Its slender 
trunk is as straight as a beam of light, and as graceful as 
the fabled trees in the mythical forests of old. The color 



148 HISTOEY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

of the bark changes with the seasons. At one time it is 
dark brown, at another tinged toward red, then gray, then 
spotted white and black and then white as snow. This is 
due to the fact that the tree sheds its bark. 

One thing might be noticed : Sycamore trees that grow 
tall and regular never get very large. The enormous trunks 
that have been seen, are ugly, crooked, twisted and seem to 
have been dwarfed in their younger years. They are, also, 
nearly always hollow, when above medium size. As the 
outside grows, the heart decays, and the larger the tree the 
thinner the shell of wood, until the gigantic sycamores are, 
upon examination, found to be mere shells. 

The seeds of the sycamore are contained in a light, yel- 
lowish ball, resembling cotton in texture and silk in color. 
The seeds attach themselves to this substance, and are 
blown by the wind about over the country. The seeds of 
the maple and sugar have a wing with which they fly 
through the air, w^hirling round and so fast that they look 
like wheels. Pine seeds are in the cones, and fall verti- 
cally to the ground, as do the acrons of oaks and the nuts 
of the liickor}'. 

The beech timber of the county has never been much 
sought after. It is of value only for a few purposes, such 
as shoe lasts, toys and whimwhams. It grows in all parts 
of the count}', but best in Canada. 

There are numerous kinds of semi-worthless timbers in 
the county, such as birch, of which there are two kinds, 
black and white, and lynn, buckej^e, elm, chestnut and 
laurel. Chestnut is of much use in making rails, and of 
some use for lumber. 

The largest amount of our timber that has been taken out, 
has gone to market in the log ; but, much of it has been 



LUMBER INTERESTS. 149 

sawed and shipped as plank. The improvement in mills 
has been gradual and steady. The first ones were hardly 
worth the name. They were unscientific, would not do 
good work and would cut only a few hundred feet a day. 
They were run by water-power, and, of course, had vertical 
saws, fastened to immense sashes, to lift which required 
nearly enough force to do all the work of sawing, if rightly 
applied. The wheels were only "flutter- wheels," which 
wasted more power than they transmitted. But, these old 
mills answered the purpose for which they were built, and 
were displaced as soon as the occasion demanded better 
works. They often would not make eighty strokes a minute. 

The sashes, much improved, are still found in the county. 
They are well constructed, and average one hundred and 
twenty strokes a minute, and do considerable work. One 
man may saw and stack one thousand feet a day, which is 
not far behind the per man average of larger mills, although 
much less than that of some. Dr. Bonnifield's was an im- 
provement on any mill in the country at the time it was 
built, but it was not what it should have been. It had three 
times more power than it put to a good use ; and its sash 
was enormously heavy. It did good work, and during the 
thirty or forty years of its existence, it cut thousands of 
feet of lumber. Some of it was sent down the river to build 
the North-western Turnpike bridge, and some went other 
places. One hundretl thousand feet was washed off in a 
freshet. It quit work about 1865. 

N. M, and George M. Parsons had a mill of the same kind 
that did a large amount of work, and sent a considerable 
amount of lumber down the river in rafts. Mills of this 
kind soon became numerous all over the county, wherever 
there was water power to run them. 



150 HISTOEY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

The tirst mill witlioiit a sash, a "miiley mill" as it was 
called, was built by Rufus Maxwell about 18G5. It was an 
improvement upon the sash mills. The saw made over 
three hundred strokes a minute. 

When steam mills were introduced into the county, the 
lumber business underwent a revolution. Or, rather, it 
suddenly sprang into life. A steam mill was erected on 
Black Fork, and was run by a company, but it did not 
prosper. Taylor's mill on Shafer's Fork did good work. 
Howe's mill, and Steringer's, and one in Canaan, all sawed 
large bills of lumber. 

The mill brought to the county by C. R. Macomber has 
surpassed any of the others in the quantity of sawing done. 
It was brought to the county about 1874, and was set at 
the mouth of Wolf Run. It remained there several years 
and was moved to the farm of Silas R. Blackman, and was 
kept there until 1880 when it was moved to Hansford Run, 
and remained there four years. 

This lumber, and all the lumber of Tucker that ever 
found its way to market, passed down Cheat River, mostly 
in rafts. 

Cheat, although a small stream in comparison with others, 
is a noted river, and it has a history worth knowing, if it all 
could only be known. But much of it never can, except in 
part. Upon its banks and in its waters have been enacted 
scenes of peace and war, and its waters have flowed red 
with the blood of battles. Its shores have been shaded by 
the groves and orchards, and there the wild Indian has 
made his home. 

The source of Cheat River is not in Tucker Count}-. The 
river comes from a thousands rivulets and rills that trickle 



LUMBER INTERESTS. 151 

over rocks and creep through the shade of overhanging 
branches, and unite, and flow onward in larger streams, over 
stony beds, through rocky cliannels, into caves and out, 
down cataracts, where the crystal spray is gray in the 
sombre shadows or painted by sunlight or moonlight or the 
pale, soft light of stars into cascades of gorgeous rainbows 
that come and go in the passing phases of the brightness 
on, down, swifter or slower as the course is steeper or more 
level, until, from the ten thousand fountain-heads, all the 
springs and rills and brooks rush together with a murmur 
of gladness and a whisper that tells that they have met 
before. 

The water that bubbles from the springs, far away in the 
mountains, under the clifts of hills, or low down in the mar- 
gins of quiet valleys, comes into the air with all the 
purity of rain, falling from the sky. No diamond in the 
crown of India's princes is more ]nire in the elements of 
beauty. "While in the crowded cities and market-places of 
the east, or the north or west or south, the summer is sul- 
try, and the throngs of people pass to and fro, burning with 
thirst, and have nothing but warm and unwholesome water 
with which to quench it, far up among the green mountains 
of Tucker are flowing and welling, free as the air and the 
light, and still more pure, if possible, the never-failing 
springs of clear, cold water, that flows forever, whether 
human lips are bathed by it or not. 

Until recently, wells were almost unknown in Tucker 
County. Springs were so plentiful, and so much better 
than wells, as the}' always are, that people had onh' to look 
around a little before building their houses, and they could 
find a place Avliere the water would be at their very door. 
Besides, where there was a spring, there could be built a 



152 HISTOllY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

good milk-liouse, a luxury to every family, and one that 
cost less than almost any other luxur}^ and one that none, 
who considered it in time, need be without. The spring, 
the milk-house, with its fresh butter and cool milk, the open 
fire place to purify the room by carrying away foul air, as 
well as to lend a cheerfulness by its light and heat, and the 
wholesome, well-done corn bread, rendered a doctor more 
ornamental than useful a few years ago, 

Some changes have taken place, and others must, of ne- 
cessity, follow as a" consequence. Every family cannot or 
does not now have a spring, a milk-house and an open fire- 
place. Springs are less plentiful and families more plenti- 
ful than they used to be, and some dig wells and keep milk 
and butter in the cellar. As the land is cleared, there is a 
tendenc}^ on the part of the springs to dry up when drouths 
come upon the country. This is due to the fact that, while 
the laud is covered with trees and timber, the rain that falls 
upon it is retained longer and is given time to soak int6 the 
ground. When in the ground, it finds sloping strata, and 
along them it flows until the surface of the ground is reached. 
This forms a spring. But when the timber has been re- 
moved and there is no rubbish to hold' the rain, it flows oft' 
into the creeks and rivers, and but little sinks into the 
ground to find the surface again in the form of springs. 
Thus, as the land is cleared, the number and floAV of springs 
diminish, while the actual annual discharge of the creeks 
and risers may increase. 

This drying up of springs, so far, has had only a little 
eftect upon Tucker County. There are still enough springs 
for each family to have a good one, and then be ten thousand 
left to flow untouched. But many do not find it convenient 
to live where tlu^ sping is, so they build away from it and 



LUMBER INTERESTS. 153 

dig a well. Wells are often very good, but they are never 
as good as a good spring, and will become more or less im- 
pure in spite of all care. 

The rills and brooks and rivulets that flow together to 
form Cheat River are as innumerable as are the trees of the 
forest. They come from every muntain and every hill, and 
every valley and vale sends down a supply. Some well 
from the high crest of upland plains, and some from subter- 
ranean caves, and some from glades and some from valleys ; 
but, all meet at last, and blend with the completeness of 
chemical affinity. 

Sbafer's Fork and Dry Fork have their sources beyond 
our borders ; but we can claim Black Fork from source to 
mouth as our own. It heads, in its numerous branches, in 
the Canaan Yalley, around the base of the Alleghanies. It 
is the outlet of the rain that falls in that basin. The Alle- 
ghanies, the water-shed between the waters of the Atlantic 
and those of the Gulf of Mexico, extend along the eastern 
and north-eastern side of Canaan, and separate the fount- 
ains of the Ohio from those of the Potomac. The country 
included between the Backbone on one side and the Alle- 
ghany on the other, was, in geological ages, a lake, which, 
by the wearing away of the rim on the south-western side, 
thereby forming a channel, was thus drained dry ; and the 
water that falls there as rain and snow, still finds an outlet 
through the same channel. This is Black Fork. 

It is formed by many streams. The head of the principal 
one is in the southern end of the valley. This is fed by 
Beaver, Little Blackwater, which gets its supply from Glady 
Fork, Long Run and from others, and by other streams 
that flow in from either side. By the time they aU unite 
and pass the gap in the Backbone, they form quite a river. 



154 HISTOEY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

Tlie name Black Fork is a descriptive one. The water is 
of a (lark red color. Not only lias it this characteristic 
while in its mountain channels; but it retains it after 
breaking away and after it has joined the clear waters of 
Shafer's Fork and Dry Fork. The whole river then, from 
there to its mouth, and even, to a less extent, the Mouon- 
galiela below, has a reddish black tinge. The rocks in the 
bottom of the river, and all bodies seen under its surface, 
put on a phantasmagoria! aspect. The color of the water 
is transmitted to them, and they appear darkly red. Even 
the fish, those particularly which live in Black Fork, are 
colored by the water. Not only does the color attach to 
their scales, surface and fins, but their flesh, if properly so 
called, is colored throughout. 

It has been to some a subject of wonder why the water is 
so colored. But, it ought to be easily observed that it is 
due to the decaying leaves and roots of evergreens, mostly 
pines. One unaccustomed to the water can taste the pine 
in it ; and a few minutes of experimenting will show that 
the hue of the water is on account of the pine. Where it 
rises from springs, unsurrounded by pines, or where it flows 
through a beech forest alone, the water is clear. If one 
will drop into one of these clear springs a handfid of de- 
caying pine leaves, he may at once observe that the water is 
colored thereby. 

With this fact understood, it is apparent that, in the 
course of a few more generations, the dark tinge which now 
characterizes the waters of Cheat, will be seen no more, and 
the history of it will be in the past. When the country 
shall become settled, and when farms shall have taken the 
place of the laurel-beds and ]-)ine forests, then the waters of 



LUMBER INTERESTS. 155 

the river will be cut oft' from their supply of decaying ever- 
greens, and will flow pure and clear. 

The influence which man wields over nature is greater 
than the unthinking ever think of. Not only can he, as he 
soon will in the case of this river, change the color of water 
that has flowed dark from time immemorial, but, it is also 
in his power to control, to some extent, the volume of water 
which a river sends out. If the Canada and Canaan Valley 
were cleared of its thickets, and all its swamps drained by a 
thorough system of underground drainage, Black Fork 
would carry ofi", in the course of the year, more water than 
it does now. And then, when heavy rains come, it would 
rise to a gi'eater height than has ever yet been known. 

Dry Fork and Black Fork unite before they reach Sha- 
fer's Fork, and after uniting take the name Black Fork, or 
Big Black Fork. It is about three miles from the conflu- 
ence of Dry Fork and Black Fork to the mouth of Shafer's 
Fork, or to where the two flow together to form the river 
proper. The battle of Corrick's Ford was fought on Sha- 
fer's Fork. Just below, is Alum Hill, a mineral formation 
of alum, from which the mountain takes its name. The 
alum comes to the surface, in little springs, and when at 
the surface, soon dries, and partly crystallizes. The alum 
is tolerably pure, but has never been used to any consid- 
erable extent. 

From the forks of the river, northward to the Preston 
County line, the river has various names at different places, 
or rather, certain places in it have been given names, which 
either describe some feature or define some locality. Job's 
Ford, or more recently Callihan's Ford, is a river- crossing 
at the Holly Meadows, and got its name first from Job 
Parsons who used to live on the north bank, and got 



156 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY 

its second name from S. M. Callihan, who more re- 
cently lived on tlie south bank. The Holly Meadows 
was named on account of the holly trees that grew and 
still grow there. They are evergreen, and the leaves 
have a fringe of thorns on them. Formerly they stood 
thick about the bottom lands; but now they are not 
so plentiful. At Job's Ford, during Garnett's retreat, Capt. 
E. Harper recommended that a stand be taken and battle 
given. The stand was taken ; but the failure of the pursu- 
ing enemy to put in an appearance, rendered a battle un- 
necessary. 

From just below Job's Ford, the river sweeps around the 
base of the mountain to Sims' Bottom', where Sims was 
killed by the Indians, and there turns toward the east. In 
this distance there are several deep eddies. After passing 
Neville's Ford, where some of the Confederates nearly 
droAvned during Garnett's retreat, the river reaches Wolf 
Run, where there is an island, and where Macomber's steam 
mill was for several years. Soon after this. Slip Hill is 
reached. This is a precipitious mountain, so steep that the 
soil has slipped into the river, leaving the bare rocks exposed. 
A road has been dug around it, and is never entirely safe. 
It is at one place about two hundred feet from the river,and 
the bluff below is almost perpendicular. A bridge, that 
looks more dangerous than it really is, spans a deep defile 
at the worst place in the road. 

Immediately beneath Slip Hill, a few years ago, a man 
named Moore was drowned, while in swimming. The water 
is deep and he got beyond his depth. Half mile further is 
the Turn Eddy, as it is called. It gets its name from two 
reasons. First, because the river there turns from its 
eastern course toward the north, and second, because, at 



LUMBER INTERESTS 

that place, at the eastern shore, the water t 
flows up streara. A log thrown into the wate 
will float up stream, turn and swim out into th 
the river. This is one of the best places on tht 
building rafts, and there have been made large ni 
log, lumber, stave and shingle rafts. 

One-half mile below here is "Willow Point, which is . 
ford, named from a thicket of willows that grow on 
bank, and extend somewhat in the shape of a wedge , 
the river. It was here that David Bonnifield was drownc 
He and George Gower were crossing when the river wa; 
deep riding, and in the swiftest place their horses threw 
them, Bonnifield was an excellent swimmer, but he never 
reached the shore. Gower could not swim at all, and 
got out. 

One-half mile further is the mouth of Horse Shoe Run, 
where the Pringles and Simpson who came through that 
country in 1764, crossed the river. There, too, James Par- 
sons crossed when escaping from the Indians near the same 
time, and there he crossed later, when the Indians tried to 
allure him into an ambuscade by gobbling like a turkey. 

From there it is not far to the Island, -which is known by 
that name over all the country. It is an Island near half 
a mile in length, densely timbered with sycamores, and has 
been a famous hiding place for deer, pursued by dogs. On 
one side of it is Wild Cat Point, a sharp cliff jutting from 
the mountain, and on the other is the Pond, which is a pond 
no longer. It used to be a slough or bay extending into the 
land ; but, in a freshet, the lower end was washed away, 
forming a channel through to the river a mile below, and 
making of the Pond an arm of the river. 

Opposite the Island is a small island of about one acre. 
On the bank by this small island, on the mainland, is the site 



OKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

n town, and there have been exhumed bones 

rger tlian those of ordinary persons. One- 

below this is Horse Shoe Ford, and half mile 

the mouth of Drj' Run, where the river is very 

I raftsmen must know the channel to go safel}' 

1. This passed, the St. George Eddy is reached. 

m Sims' Bottom to this point the river flows round the 

ie Shoe, a distance of six miles. But, from river to 

av, across the isthmus, the distance is scarcely one-sixth 

lat far. Could a canal be cut across this neck of land, it 

would give the facilities for a tremendous water-power, one 

sufficient to drive ten times as much machinery as there is 

or probably ever will be in the county. 

The Horse Shoe is named from its resemblance to the 
shoe of a horse. From cork to cork, so to speak, the dis- 
tance is scarcely more than one mile, while around, it is six. 
The St. George Eddy extends from the mouth of the 
Pond, the lower end of the Horse Shoe, to Ewin's Ford, be- 
low St. George, and is about one mile in length. It is per- 
haps the most picturesque and beautiful portion of the 
river. St. George stands on its shore, thus lending an air 
of life and civilization to the rural scenery along its banks ; 
while on the south side (for the river here flows westerly) a 
steep, forest-covered mountain rises abruptly from the wa- 
ter's edge, as a blufl', and then, after gaining a certain 
height, slopes gradually back to the higher summit beyond. 
"When the river is low, as it generally is in the summer time, 
St. George Eddy is remarkably calm and placid. The wa- 
ter jnoves slowly and silently, and its surface is covered 
Avith white bubbles, Avhich float lightly, and form a marked 
contrast with the dark, red water of the river. 

The Rocks, about one-half a mile above the town, arc a 



LUMBEK INTERESTS. 159 

nice landing for skiffs; and pleasure parties often go on 
excursions there. Thick trees overshadow it, and a stream 
of cold Avater dashes down the steep mountain side, and is 
lost in the sombre river. At other points along the same 
shore, above and below, rivulets come down the hills by 
cataracts and cascades, until their final leap carries them 
into the deep water of the river. In winter these rills from 
the mountain freeze, and the ice piles thicker and higher, 
until the whole face of the hill becomes a glacier, and re- 
mains so until the warm winds of spring destroy the ice. 
But, the river and the scener}- along its shores are seen in 
all their beauty only in the summer, when the trees are in 
full leaf. A fringe of trees lines the northern shore, and 
the foliage of maples, sugars, sycamores, beeches and other 
woods are blended in a verdant wall of quiet freshness. 
Just beyond, but seen only through the openings here and 
there in the groves, are the fields of farms, where the plan- 
tations of corn, and the acres of small grains and grasses ex- 
tend furlongs back from the river, and separate it from the 
steep rise of the mountains beyond. 

In the summer evenings the mountains and trees cast 
their shadows over the river, and make it a delightful place 
for boat-riding. It is much frequented by persons, young 
and old, in the evening, and the painted skitl's, Indian ca- 
noes and other barks may be seen floating placidly upon the 
water or passing swiftly to and fro. 

At the lower end of the St. George Eddy is Ewin's Ford, 
named from Hon. Wm. Ewin who lives upon the bank of the 
river at that place. This is at the mouth of Clover Eun, 
and here the road to Rowlesburg crosses the river. 

The next feature in the river, worthy of note, is Anvil's 
Mill Dam, a dam built by John Anvil across the river to 



160 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

turn water into his mill race. The dam is a difficult place 
to be gotten over by raftsmen, and afterward it is a hard 
channel to keep. Rattlesnake Ford is named on account of 
a den of rattlesnakes that Avere formerly there. Jonathan 
Run is where Jonathan Minear was killed by the Indians, 
and is a considerable rafting wharf. From there to Miller 
Hill the river is straight, and the raftsmen steer for a rock 
that looks white in the summer time and black in the winter, 
when there is snow on the ground. 

"When the river ]Dasses the mouth of Bull Run, and trends 
off toward the east, it is washing the rugged base of Miller 
Hill, named from William Miller, who lives there. The 
Rowlesburg road passes around the hill, and from it the 
river, dashing over its rocky wa}', presents a scene of 
romance and beauty. When upon the river, it is found to 
be unusually narrow and swift, and it so bends that it is hard 
to keep rafts from running upon the bowlders that have 
rolled down from the hill and lie in the edge of the water. 
The waves roll high, and, some years ago, when the Rowles- 
burg Lumber and Iron Compau}' run boats on the river to 
carry shingles to Rowlesburg, this part of the river was 
found to be the most difficult to pass, on account of the 
height and crestedness of the waves. 

At the lower end of Miller Hill the river strikes fairly 
against the mountain, and turns to the north. Where it 
makes the turn, is a deep hole of water, with the dreadful 
name of " Murder Hole." River men remember it, because, 
upon entering it at full speed, as rafts do after passing 
through two miles of swift water, the oars strike dead water, 
and, by sluing, frequently knock the men into the river. 
There are different accounts as to how this eddy got its 
name. One is that wolves once killed a band of sheep on 



LUMBER INTERESTS. 161 

the bank near by, and another that a man was aecidentlj 
drowned there. 

Two small islands, named Pig and Macadonia, are soon 
passed, and the river is drawing near Licking Falls. This 
is another rough place, where the river falls several feet in a 
small distance. It is flowing north when it strikes Lime- 
stone Monntain, and by it is deflected toward the west. 
Where it strikes the mountain, the rage of years and cen- 
turies of floods have torn out rocks from the earth, and the 
river is partly blocked up with them. As the waters are 
damned up, and break over, they form Licking Falls, at the 
mouth of Licking Creek, and near where Lieut. Robert 
McChesney was killed. 

Turtle Rocks are soon passed. These are several large, 
angular rocks, rising out of the river on the northern or 
eastern side, Avhere the water is deep. In the summer time 
large numbers of clumsy, lazy turtles may be seen basking 
in the sunshine, and from this the rocks take their name. 

The Seven Islands are well known to all rivermen ; for, if 
a raft can pass there, its way to Rowlesburg can be de- 
pended upon. The islands seem to have been seven in 
number when they got their name ; but the number is not 
constant. They are partly sand bars, and a flood in the 
river may build or destroy several of them. 

The river now passes from Tucker into Preston. From 
where it first enters the count}- io where it leaves it, follow- 
ing the Avindings of the river, is from forty to sixty miles, 
depending upon which fork is measured. It does not flov/ 
with a uniform rapidity through the county. At times it is 
very swift, and again it is slow. Among tlie mountains 
it is swifter than after it reaches the Holly Meadows. Thirty 

miles, the distance from the Turn Eddy to Rowlesburg, has 

11 



1C2 HISTOEY OF TUCKEE COUNTY. 

Leeii run in five hours by boats on a good stage of water. 
TVlien tlie water is low, of course, tlie progress is less rapid. 
Often it takes twelve hours to make the same trip. Eafts 
and boats go onh' a very little faster than the current of 
the river. 

The timber that is saAved into lumber in Tucker County 
and is taken to market, goes down the river in rafts to 
Howlesburg. A large number of log rafts go down annually. 
An average raft contains seventy logs, and twent3'-five 
thousand feet. The logs are held together by polls fastened 
across the logs by staples. Oars from twent}^ to fift}' feet 
long are placed on the ends of the rafts to keep them in the 
channel. 

Among the most noted log raftsmen who have been along 
the river of late 3-ears, may be mentioned William H. Lips- 
comb, Thomas F. Hebb, Baxter Long, S. E. Parsons, Philip 
Constable, Charles Parsons, Lloyd Hansford, Magarga Par- 
sons, L. E. Goff, Hiram Loughry and Finley" Toy. 

Anotlier kind of rafts is that of planks or saAved lumber. 
This has been an important industry in the county, and is- 
still largely carried on. Planks are rafted by building them 
into platforms, usuall}- sixteen feet square, and twelve inches 
thick, and then lashing the platforms end to end, until the 
raft is from sixty-four to one hundred and twenty-eight feet 
long. Two such rafts, side by side, are called a "double 
raft ;" and when they are laden with lumber until the plat- 
forms are entirely sunken, they contain about seventy -five 
thousand feet. The most extensive lumber rafter of Tucker 
Comity, is C. E. Macomber, who has thus taken to market 
millions of feet. Others who have rafted extensively are 
A. C. Minear, Finley Toy, AV. D. Losh, A. H. Bounificld 
and ot]i«-'rs. The largest plank rafts have four oars. 



LUMBER INTEEESTS. 163 

An industry that has sprung up within the past few years 
in Tucker, and one that brings in a considerable revenue, is 
the shingle mills. The first was built by the Eowlesburg 
Lumber and Iron Company at John Fansler's on Horse 
Shoe Run, some eight miles above St. George. The mill 
was something new in the country, as its steam engine was 
the first one ever in the county, and people came from near 
and far to see it. The tram-road, which brought logs to 
the mill was also the first thing of that sort ever in the 
county, and its trucks were looked upon with a wonder sec- 
ond only to that excited b}- the steam engine. 

The mill Avas built by Balus, a mill-wright from Balti- 
more, and the machinery was set up by Frank Blanchard, 
who sawed the first shingle ever sawed in Tucker County, 
He was and is one of the best machinists in the State. 
When the mill was gotten ready to run, large croAvds came 
together to see the fool thing start. Some said that it was 
a grand thing and others that it would be the ruination of 
the country. However, it got to going, and worked to per- 
fection, cutting eight thousand shingles a day. They were 
eighteen inches long and four inches wide. Of course, some 
were wider and some not so wide ; but, this was what was 
required in the measurement. They were packed into 
bunches of two hundred and fifty each, and were hauled to 
the river on sleds in the winter time and on wagons in the 
summer. Among those who hauled were Ward Parsons, C. 
L. Parsons, John Closs, B. F. Dumire, James Knotts and 
William Losh. The mill was kept running for several years, 
and until the Rowlesburg Lumber and Iron Company went 
into bankruptc}-. After that the mill was run at intervals 
imtil all the timber in the vicinity had been cut, when it 
was removed. The most prosperous period of the mill's 
existence was about 1870. 



164 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

The next shingle-mill in the county was that built by 
Rufus Maxwell, and run by water-power. In its after mod- 
ifications, the saw ran horizontal instead of vertical. 

Abraham and Daniel L. Dumire built the next one on 
Laurel Run, at the Lead Mine post-office. This mill was 
sold from one to another, until the controlling interest was 
in the hands of Cyrus Dumire. George Anvil built the 
next shingle factory. It was located on Mill Run, about 
two miles above St. George. 

David Closs built the next mill. It was on Horse Shoe 
Run, four miles from its mouth. This completed the list 
of five shingle mills in Tucker County. The first one ever 
in the county met an untimely end. While being taken 
around Horse Shoe Ford Hill, it, wagon, horses and all, 
rolled down the precij)ice into the river, near one hundred 
feet. None of the men or horses were seriously hurt, but 
the machinery and the wagons were badly wrecked. 

The shook business, some fifteen and twenty years ago, 
was an extensive industry. Joseph Davis was the principal 
manager of the business, and the shop was at St. George. 
It did more for the town than anything else of the time. It 
built up the houses that were going to pieces, and revived 
business. 

Although Tucker County has had and still has vast timber 
resources, and its thousand mountains are covered ^vith 
valuable pines, oaks, poplars and hemlocks, and all this will 
bring a revenue into the county ; yet our real and perma- 
nent wealth is not in our timber. Men who deal in it and 
attend closely to their business have made money from it ; 
but such is the exception and not the rule. The large con- 
tractors may or may not make something ; but the laliorer 
is almost sure to lose Avhen it comes to the final reckoning. 



LUMBER INTEEESTS. 165 

He may have "svorked hard from Christmas to Christmas, 
and his family may have lived as economically as decency 
and comfort would permit, yet at the end of the 3'ear, v^hen 
all store debts and doctor bills are paid, and the wear and 
tear of the furniture and the farm property has been made 
good, all the spare money is gone, and the laborer is left no 
richer than when he set in for the hard year of work. 

The reason for this is to be sought in the fact that almost 
every man in "^Cucker County is a farmer. It is a general 
truth the world over that it is best for an agricultural man 
to stick to agriculture just the same as it is best, in usual 
cases, for any man to stick to his trade or profession. It 
may pay at times for a man to carry on two, three or a 
dozen projects at a time ; but those who try it fail oftener 
than they succeed. Especially is this true with farmers any- 
where, and the more so with those of Tucker County. A 
blacksmith or a carpenter may, if he sees fit, abandon his 
trade one, two or ten years, and again take it up and be none 
the loser, unless the time has been a loss to him. But not 
so with him who digs into the fertile soil for his bread and 
his fortune. His farm needs him every day and every hour. 
If he leaves it, it suffers from his neglect. If he engages 
as a laborer in the lumber business, as so many of the 
Tucker farmers are doing and have done, he fails to till his 
land as he should. His fences go to ruin, his sheds fall to 
pieces and weeds, briers, thorns and brambles fill all the 
nooks and corners of his fields. 

Meanwhile, the man ma}' be getting his wages, which are 
in ready money and for the time seem greater than he 
could make on his farm; but, everything his famil}' uses 
must be paid for, and the expenses eat up the profits, and 
he works on, probably for years, and keeps just about even. 



IGG HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

Tlien tlie mill on wliicli lie works is to be moved to find a 
new supply of timber, and lie must either follow or quit the 
works. 

If he is a wise man, he quits the bad contract, late, but 
better late than never, and goes back to his neglected farm. 
Or, if he follows the mill to its neAV site, he may as well set- 
tle down to a permanent rough and unprofitable life, drag- 
ging himself and family about from place to place, and 
living only a little better than the Arabs of Egypt. 

If he goes back to his farm, he finds it grown up and di- 
lapidated, far worse than when he left it, and he finds him- 
self no richer in money than when he went astray in the 
lumber business. Had he staid on his farm and worked as 
hard as he did in the woods, he would have owned a neat, 
comfortable and complete home. His fences would not 
have been so hidden by briers that they were no longer vis- 
ible, and the apple trees would not look like a chaos of 
sprouts and scions growing out of a brush-heap. Where 
the plantain and smartweed were taking possession of every- 
thing in the yard, his wife's bed of flowers would have been 
in full bloom, and lilies and forget-me-nots would be blos- 
soming instead of the crash-leaved burr-dock. 

He will then learn, as others must learn and are learning, 
that the little farms of Tucker must be cultivated if the peo- 
ple expect to prosper. The farmer who raises something to 
sell in the logging camps makes more than the man who 
works all the year in the woods. Our real wealth is in our 
farming land. Let the lumber be cut by those who can af- 
ford to do it. The farmer cannot aftbrd to lose his time. 



CHAPTER IX. 
THE ^yEsT yinaiNiA central and pjtts- 

B JJRGH RAIEWA Y. 

The opening of tliis new railroad lias been and prondses 
still to^be a permanent improvement to our count}'. Tlie 
object wlncli prompted its building was tlie vast resource of 
timber, coal and iron wliicli abound in tliat portion of our 
territory wliicli lies beyond the Backbone Mountain, on tlie 
upper tributaries of tlie Black Fork of Cheat Eiver, The 
knowledge that such resources existed is no new thing. As 
early as 185G, it was undertaken to build a railroad up the 
North Branch of the Potomac, and engineers were x^ut to 
work on it. The following extract is from the Biography 
of Abe Bonnifield, and is quoted in connection with the 
railroad, and also as a^description of the surrounding coun- 
try at that time : 

In front of my father's door, and at the distance of three or four 
miles, rises the principal ridge of the Backbone Mountain. From 
the tops of the neighboring hills the course of the ridge can be 
traced to a vast extent. The svumuit of the mountain in this region 
is covered with beautiful groves of hemlock i)ine, sometimes called 
yew pine. In places their branches are so interwoven that tlif'y 
form a thick, dark shade, which, in the summer season, is most de- 
lightful, but in winter, when the sombre branches are drooping 
with snow, the prospect is gloomy beyond description. These 
hemlocks are as straight as an Indian arrow, and frequently rise to 
the height of one hundred and twenty feet, or more. This timber 
is valuable for building purposes. Square timljer, plank and shin- 
gles made from it are of the very best quality; and the (luantity of 
this timber is surprising. From the top of a single hill, enough of 
it may be seen to build a city 



IGS HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY 

On tliis side of the mountain, just opposite my father's farm, lies 
a large body of rieli lantl, which, on account of its being covered 
■with sugar-mai)le, is called the Sugar Lands. The annvxal blooming 
of this large grove of sugar trees, appearing with the return of 
each successive season, alfoi'ded, for many years, a picture of sur- 
passing beauty. It could easily be seen from the distance of fifteen 
or twenty miles. Year after year for fifty long successive years, 
had the older inhabitants gazed upon its expanse of silvery gray, 
tinged with yellow and white. From the top of Stemple Ridge, a 
distance of some eighteen miles. It appeared to the very best ad- 
vantage, and gave to the extended landscape a soft and beautiful 
finish, on which the eye lingered with peculiar delight. But. alas ! 
the beauty, though it lasted long and gladdened many a vernal 
scene, has passeil away and perished forever. 

About fifteen hundred acres of the land was purchased !)>' Wil- 
liam R. Parsons, and the sugar trees have fallen beneath the axes 
of his slaves. But, thank kind nature, it is usually the case, 
when one beautiful object disappears, another takes* its place. 
Although the sugar trees are gone, the eye of the spectator is now 
greeted with green pastures and charming meadows, while the ear 
is saluted Avith the tinkling of bells and the lowing of cattle, and 
this delightful Sugar Lands promises fair soon to be the richest 
glazing plantation in Tucker County. 

Some miles beyond the Sugar Lands, and also ):)eyond The Back- 
bone, on the head l)ranches of Cheat Tliver, tliere is an elevated 
region of rich land, from time inunemorial called the land of Ca- 
naan. Here there is a body of some hundred thousand acres of 
laiid uiioe(Mii)ie(l. However, it has {piite recently come into mar- 
ket. The soil of this land is of the finest cpiality, both for grain 
and pasture, and is mostly covered with extensive forests of beech, 
sugar and pine, 'i'here are also several other lai'ge unoccupied 
tracts of land in Tucker County, iu)w coming into market. A vast 
field of excellent stone coal has lately been discoA-ered on these 
lai.ds, making tiieui an object of i)ecuhar interest to speculator.s. 
From I'iedmouT, on the B. «fc O. R. R. a railroad will .soon be built, 
whose terminus will be in these coal lands. 

How sudi vast l)o(h'es of waste land, siu'roundeil on all sides by 
rich si'ttlejiients. could remain so long unsold, is a prol)lem that 



THE W. V. C. c^ P. EAILAVAY. 169 

can be solved only by the consideration that the tide of emigration 
has ever rolled its waves to the far West, without stopping to ex- 
amine these beautiful little islands around which it flowed. The 
owners of these lands seem anxious to sell, and it is probable that 
bargains may be obtained. It is supposed that there is at this time 
[1857] i^lenty of unoccupied land in Tucker County for the accom- 
modation of 500 families. 

The coal at tlie Sugar Lands was discovered aboiit 1835. 
It was nearly twenty years before any similar discoveries 
were made on tlie other side of the mountain. But, finally, 
the true wealth of the country began to be known, and cap- 
italists saw that there was money in a railroad which would 
carry off" this wealth. The work of surveying was well ad- 
vanced, when the war came on and put a stop to everything, 
and it was near twenty years before anything further was 
done in the matter. Then a new company took it in hand. 
The officers, on January 1, 1882, were : H. G. Davis, Presi- 
dent ; S. B. Elkins, Vice-President. Directors : Alexander 
Shaw, James G. Blaine, S. B. Elkins, "William Kej^ser, 
Thomas B. Davis, Augustus Schell, W. H. Barnum, J. N. 
Camden, John A. Hambleton and T. E. Sickles. A. Ebert 
was Secretary, C. M. Hoult, Treasurer, T. E. Sickles, Chief 
Engineer, and W. E. Porter, Superintendent. The offices 
were at Piedmont, "W. Va., and 92 Broadwaj', New York 
City. 

The company was organized June 25, 1881, under a char- 
ter of the State of West Virginia. It was authorized to 
construct a railroad from any point on the B. <k O. R. Pi., 
along the waters of the North Branch of the Potomac Eiver, 
to a connection with any other railroad in the State of W. 
Va. The company had power to buy and sell real estate 
without limit ; and it was authorized to manufacture lumber, 
mine coal and iron, and any other minerals. The following 



170 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

extract is from the President's first Report to the stock- 

liolders : 

The present intention of the comi^any is to extend its railroad 
for a distance of from fifty to sixty miles in all, throngh what is 
knoAvn as the "Cumberland or Piedmont Coal Basin;'" and it is 
ultimately intended, if deemed advisable and profitable, to extend 
its line southerly, so as to connect the Baltimoi-e and Ohio Railroad 
with the (J!hesapeake and Ohio Railroad and the Richmond and 
Alleghany Railroad, and other railroads. Also, northerly to a con- 
nection with railroads leading to Pittsburgh. 

The engineers estimated that three hundred and sixty 
millions of tons of coal can he mined from the company's 
lands. The coal fields which must be developed by this 
company embrace an area larger than the aggregate of all 
other bituminous coal fields east of the Alleghany Moimt- 
ains," embracing an area of 170,000 acres. The capital 
stock of the company was $6,000,000, of which 15,000,000 
belong to and remain in the company's treasur3^i• The rail- 
road was computed to cost not more than $25,000 per mile. 

The average out-put of coal over the road in 1882 was es- 
timated to be 700 tons daily for three hundred days, sum- 
ming for the year 210,000 tons. The company's profit was 
forty-five cents per ton, for the year $94,500. Profits from 
other sources, $20,000. Total, $114,500. The interest 
paid on bonds was $50,000, leaving a clear profit for 1882 of 
$64,500. The profit for 1883 was estimated at $197,000.^ 

The President, Vice-President, Treasurer and Secretary 
charged nothing for their services in the year 1882. The 
company at that time owned and controlled 37,752 acres of 
mineral and timber lands. 

' President Davis' first report, page four. t lu 1882. 

; This Is merely au estimation, made In 1882 for the succeeding year. 



THE W. V. C. cfe P. RAILWAY. 171 

Up to January 1, 1882, tliirteen and one-lialf miles of 
road had been completed. 

In Owen Riordan's Report of January 3, 1882 lie speaks 
as follows : "■ 

1 hereby submit to your consideration a report, with accompany- 
ing map, of the result of uiy opening and Avorking of coal veins in 
your employment since June 1, of last year (1881). 

I Avorked on a portion of Grant, Tucker and Pj-eston Counties, 
W, Va. Commencing at the Fairfax Stone, I opened on what I 
call the "Fairfax and Dobbin House Region"— which is about nine 
miles long and eight miles wide — ten different veins of coal, the 
thickest being eleven and the smallest four feet, measuring in the 
aggregate fifty-two feet of coal. 

These veins of coal are of different quality, some gas, some bitu- 
minous and one vein of good coking coal. They are so situated, 
one above the other, that any one of them, or all of them together, 
can be worked without interfering with uny other. 

This is the most j-emarkable coal region so far discovered in this 
or any other country. I have neither seen nor read in the reports 
of any other person of a coal region having as much coal in it as 
this ; and the whole of it is free from slate, bone-coal, or any other 
impurities. This is neither exaggeration nor delusion, as all these 
veins are opened, so that any expert can examine them. He will 
find them to be just as I have stated. There is a nine-feet vein of 
steam coal in this region that fully equals the Cumberland coal. 

We opened on the second division of this AVest Virginia Coal 
Fields — which lies between the Dobbin and Kent roads and the 
mouth of Buffalo Creek— eleven different veins of coal, ranging in 
thickness from three to six feet. This coal is semi-bituminous in 
quality, except one vein opened at the head of Elk Run, of cannel 
coal, three feet thick. The coal in this region is also free from all 
impurities 

The coal area is a thick forest, almost covered Avith spruce and 
hemlock, the trees being of an enormous size, and good quality, 
making it as superior in its timber as in its coal. 

' See the President's and Engineer's Reports of the progress of the Railroad, of Octo- 
Der 17, 1882. 



172 HISTOEY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

In the President's Annual Report, dated January 9, 1883, 
the net earnings of the road, after paying expenses, and the 
interest on the bonded debt, were over $87,000. The op- 
erating expenses were 48f per cent, of the gross earnings. 
The interest paid was $32,600. 

On page 4, of the Report of January- 9, 1883, the follow- 
ing is found : 

After careful surveys, it has been determined to make Davis tlie 
terminus of the road for the present. It promises to be the center 
of a great mining and lumbering interest, being near the junction 
of the Beaver and Blackwater, both of which drain a fine timber 
country, and both are well adapted to floating logs ; besides, tlxe 
site selected and vicinity are underlaid with the veins of coal of the 
Upper Potomac Coal Field. 

The completion of the line to Davis, fifty-three miles from Pied- 
mont, will quadruple the capacity of the Company for doing a gen- 
eral transportation business ; besides, it will reach and pass through 
the Company's coking coal and fine timber lands in the Upper Po- 
tomac Coal Fields from both of which the Company expects to add 
largely to its business." 

The work of the railroad in Tucker County, up to this 
time, 1884, has not been extensive, as the main work has 
been done on the east side of the mountain. The grade 
across the mountain does not at any point exceed eighty 
feet per mile, which is the lightest grade of any railroad 
crossing the AUeghanies. 

The whole Canaan Valley must soon be developed. It is 
just opening up to the world, and in a few years it will no 
longer be a wilderness. 



CHAPTER X. 
MISCELLANEOUS STATLSTLCS. 

I DO not deem it best to over load a County History witli 
statistics. Enough should be given to meet the wants of 
the general reader, and no more. In this book I have 
pursued, in this respect, the course just advocated. I have 
collected, not without care, a few tables and have inserted 
them. In making the selections and in the arrangements I 
have not followed any strict plan. In fact, I found it im- 
possible, had I been so inclined, to make out entire census 
tables, even from 1856 to the present time. Much, of the 
data that would go to make up such tables, does not exist 
in any official manner ; or, at least, the search that I have 
made has failed to find it. I give what this chapter contains 
and offer no apology for its incompleteness or for its 
arrangement. Had I considered it of enough importance, 
I should have bestowed more time and attention to it. I 
did not even go to Eandolph to examine records that relate 
to the census prior to 1856. AVhat I have of such, is all I 
want ; for, I will repeat that it is not my aim or intention 
to make this book a series of tables and statistical figures. 
I am not certain but that I have given more space to the 
History of Elections and Officers than is demanded by the 
public upon whose patronage the financial success of this 
book depends. But, this latter subject will, more or less, 
interest every reader, while the former, that of the statistics^ 
will be of interest to so few, except a small part of it, that 
those few will find occasion to examine for themselves 



174 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

special books on the subject, and will there find mnch more 
satisfaction than could possibly be given in a work of this 
kind. 

As remarked, it would be difficult to reduce to a system 
the statistics relative to Tucker. The Census Compendium 
of 18G0 dismissed the county with a foot-note, sa3'ing that 
no returns were made. Thus I had to look elsewhere for 
what I have given of that date. The Compendium of 1870 
was fuller, but it all, so far as our county is concerned, is 
easily told, and I have given only an epitome of 1860 and 
1870. But I have bestowed more attention to 1880, because 
I consider it of more importance. I consider that our 
count}^ is just starting into life. The returns of ten and 
twenty years ago are valuable to us only as curiosities, or as 
comparisons. They do not tell the world what we are, or 
what the resources of our count}' were at that time. They 
do not exhibit our true Avealth — undeveloped wealth. This 
was unknown then, and there should be no pride, and surely 
is no policy, in publishing to the world, by census tables, 
how little we had and how weak we were onl}' a few years 
ago. True, it is some satisfaction to see how we have 
grown ; and where there is an opportunit}' for exhibiting 
this in a proper manner, it has been done, but, in such mat- 
ters as promise no good, and result in no benefit, we have 
been silent. 

Such parts of the past as is history, I have given. What 
is not history, romance, biography or anything of that kind. 
I have not gone to extremes to bring prominently forward. 
I have endeavored to show what we were, so far as we were 
anything, and what we are. The future must tell what we 
are to be. But, with us, the future is more than the past. 
This age is using the past only to judge by it wjiat the 



MISCELLANEOUS STATISTICS. 175 

future will be. Great minds read liistor}- only for this. 
The past is notliing to us, except the mere satisfaction of 
knowing it. Tliere are greater changes going on in the 
world to-day than ever before. History- did not prophesy 
them. It gave no hint that the}' would come. The loco- 
motive, the steamship, the telegraph, the telephone, and 
the marvellous machineries that work, as it Avere, with more 
than human intelligence, came into the world unheralded 
and unexpected. Not even a star guided the Magi of the 
present to them. They leaped, as Pallas, armed into the 
world's arena, and assuming the might of Achilles, cleared 
the fields of a universal Troy. 

Still, I cannot think that history is useless or unneces- 
sar}'. There is still something to be learned from it ; al- 
though, I verily believe that there is more to be gained 
from Mathematics and Chemistr}^ than from History. We 
cannot judge, and depend upon it, from the past what the 
future will be. Because no nation has lived forever, is no 
reason Avhy none ever will. Because no government of the 
people, by the people and for the people has ever stood 
firmly and successfully one hundred years, is no grounds 
from which to judge that such a thing is impossible. It 
may be that Confucius thought it impossible for a man to 
travel fifty miles an hour, because his experience and his 
old books gave him none assurance of such a thing in the 
past. No doubt Columbus considered it out of the ques- 
tion to cross the Atlantic without sails in ten days ; and, he 
could not have found reason for thinking so had he read all 
the histories burnt at Alexandria, the description of Hiero's 
engine not excepted. Galilleo or Newton or Keplar or Kant 
or Hobbs or Tycho Brahe would have disbelieved it possi- 
ble to send a letter tAvo hundred and eighty-eight thousand 



17G HISTOllY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

miles a second. Arclnmecles and Copernicus gave nothing 
to foreshadow sucli a thing. Nor, woukl those ohl philoso- 
phers have believed that the voice of a man could be heard 
over a wire fort}' miles. 

Yet, just such things as these men thought impossible, if 
they thought at all, are tearing the Avorld upside down and 
building it anew, on a firmer basis than ever. Mathematics, 
called Philosoph}', and Chemistrv, are doing it. But they 
are inanimate, and Avork only by the directions of man. 
Why then could not man curb the lightning, and know and 
control the power of oxygen and hydrogen, expanded by 
heat seventeen hundred times its bulk when cold — why 
could not this have been done two thousand j^ears ago ? or 
five thousand, for that matter ? Water existed, as did tire, 
and iron and electricity and all the elements that now exist ; 
Avliy then could not Tubal-cain build a steam engine, and 
an ocean telegraplij connecting Rome and Carthage, across 
the sea, that they thought was in the middle of the world? 

This question Avas hard to answer. It was hard be- 
cause the answer was unknoAvn. Some of the abstractesfc 
problems in calculus are easy enough to understand when 
the answer is known ; but, to find the ansAver caused many 
a brain to falter and ache and doubt and despair, to resoh^e 
again and tinall}" to triumph. Thiis Avitli the subject, Avhy 
the ancients, or even the moderns, except the most moderns, 
failed to accomplish Avhat is noAV being done by men AAdt]ji 
Aveaker minds than that of Miilcil)er or Minos or Danlalus 
or Plutarch or Qiiintilian or Euclid or Descartes or Benja- 
min Franklin. It seems now that things are accomplished 
Avith less effort than Avas formerly exerted to no good. Surely 
our iuA'Cntors do not study more intently than he Avho stood 
thirty-six hours, Avorking mentally on a sum of arithmetic, 




S. J. Maxwell. 



Mrs LowTHER Mrs Wm Spesert 




W. B. Maxwell C. H. Maxwell J. P. Maxwell T. E. Maxwell. 

R. R. Maxwell. L. H, Maxwell, C. J. Maxwell Hu Maxwell. 



MISCELLANEOUS STATISTICS. 177 

and knew nothing of the heat or the darkness or the rain 
that passed by ; or more intensely than he who was so ab- 
sorbed with his theorem that he knev.' not that an army with 
beating drnms and martial music passed under his window ; 
or than he who, when the Roman soldier rushed into his 
study with drawn sword to kill him, cried, "Wait till I com- 
plete this demonstration," and when it was completed, died, 
as Socrates died, like a philosopher. 

Physical and mental efforts, I doubt not, were as power- 
ful, or as near the limit of human possibilities, thousands of 
years ago as they are to-day. The men tried as hard to 
solve the mysteries, and worked as hard on their plans, and 
did as much as they could, and moderns can do nothing 
more. But the ancients, viewed from our stand-point, made 
almost no advancement at all. It may have taken them a 
thousand years to invent the bow and arrow. It seems to 
us that anybody could manufacture such an engine with a 
few daj'S of study. 

But, we must not forget ourselves in approaching this 
subject. The world is not, or man's mind is not, as it used 
to be. The oldest man in the world, at the age of nine hun- 
dred, if any man ever really lived that long, did not know 
as much as a school boy of to-da3\ I cannot imagine with 
what feelings Abraham, the Patriarch, must have looked 
upon the phenomena of nature, not knowing any of the 
reasons for what he saw. But, I need not appeal to my 
imagination in a case of this kind. His feelings npon see- 
ing the water flow down hill and the smoke rise skyward, 
must have been as mine v.hen I contemplate the nature of 
force as it is manifested in magnetism, sunlight and the dis- 
sociation of atoms — things which are blank mj'steries to me. 

No, the history of the past cannot be laid aside. I am 



178 HISTOIIY OF TUCKEK COUKTY. 

firmly of the belief that the human race, as a whole, im- 
proves from the experience of past races, jnst as an indi- 
•vidual grows wiser by remembering^ his past successes and 
failures. It is a dark subject to me ; but, so far as I can 
understand it, I see nothing that does not confirm me in the 
belief that there is a universal mind, or spirit, or soul, or 
nature, or something not exactly' expressed by any word in 
the world, that is composed of and includes all the minds 
in the world, as a great and perfect whole. It is hard to 
express myself on this subject. Tennyson in Locksley Hall 
does it for me better than I can do it : 

Yet I doubt not tlii'ough the ages one increasing purpose runs, 
And the thouglits of men ai-e widened with the process of the suns. 

When one generation dies from the world, the next does 
not have to commence in knowledge where its fathers did, 
but, in a measure, where its fathers quit. The " increasing- 
purpose " does not die with the races of men. It lives from 
generation to generation, from age to age and from century 
to century, ever stronger and stronger. As the old rocks 
from the cliffs of the mountains and from the caves of the 
ocean are ground into powder to furnish material for Tier: 
fojmations, so must the experience of the past be picked 
apart to furnish material for the rebuilding of newer and 
better institutions. So must history be used in the present. 
So must we build b}- the ruins of the past. But the simile 
is not perfect, for the intellectual world builds grander and 
better and finds constantl}' some new material to introduce 
into the work, while the geological world constructs from 
the same inaterial over and over again, and the new work, 
although newer, is in reality not a particle better than the 
old. 

Scientists disagree, Avhether intellectual power is trans- 



MISCELLANEOUS STATISTICS. 179 

mitted from generation to generation. On the one side is 
arrayed the long catalogue of illustrious families, the splen- 
dor of whose talents has been observed for generations, and 
a similitude noticed in all. On the other hand, it is claimed 
that a savage infant, the child of savage parents, may be 
trained to civilzation and enlightenment and be none the 
less refined and gifted than one born and reared in all the 
conditions of civilization. There are two sides to the ques- 
tion, and either is not void of argument ; but, it must be ad- 
mitted that parental characteristics, of mind as well as body, 
are transmitted from generation to generation. How else 
could there be an increasing purpose running through the 
ages, as there surelj' is? Then there is occasion still for 
learning, and from the past, all there is to know or to be 
known. We cannot learn from the future. The present is 
only the twilight of the past. 

As the world stands now, there is more benefit to man- 
kind in the sermons of Talmage than in the histories of 
Gibbon. The times are turning. There is greater change 
in one year now than there was in a century some thousand 
years ago. At least, this is true so far as we can tell ; but 
if we could see as things were seen when Yirgil sang and 
Demosthenes raved, we might know that we are mistaken. 
They laughed at Pythagoras when he thought that the 
world was round. Is no one being laughed at to-day who 
will be remembered when the deriders are forgotton? Is 
there not extant some theory so ridiculous that it is hardly 
worth laughing at ? Who knows what the philosophers two 
thousand years hence will say of it? What was the 
woman's name avIio laughed at Newton and called him a 
simpleton for sitting in the orchard to see the apples fall ? 
The circumstance alone is remembered, and that because 



180 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

of its surroundings. Too many people are like tlie young 
lord, on wliose hand the king leaned, in that beleagured 
city, where the famine raged, and where the prophet fore- 
told plenty, and to whom the young lord answered that 
such a thing might be if the windows of heaven should be 
opened. 

In 1880, there were in Tucker 3,139 persons of American 
birth, and 2,053 were born in the State : 936 were born in 
Virginia. Of the remainder, 3 were born in Ohio, 58 in 
Pennsylvania, 38 in Maryland. There were 12 of foreign 
birth, of Avhom 2 were from Ireland, 2 from Scotland, 4 
from Germany and 1 from France. The rest are ungiven. 

Of the 3,151 persons in the county in 1880, 1,625 were 
males and 1,526 were females. From the age of five to 
seventeen, inclusive of both, there were 546 males and 512 
females. From eighteen to forty-four, inclusive of both, 
there were 580 men. There were 618 men twenty-one years 
of age, or over. 

In 1880, Tucker had 385 farms, containing 19,632 acres of 
improved land. The value of the farms, including all they 
contained, fences and buildings, was $590,782. The farm- 
ing implements and machinery were worth $23,661. The 
value of stock was placed at $102,917. The building and 
repairing of fences cost $18,223. This was for the year 
1879. The value of fertilizers purchased was $456. The 
value of all farm productions, sold, consumed and on hand, 
was placed at $75,152. 

In 1880, the county produced 5,784 bushels of buckwheat; 
63,632 bushels of corn ; 15,221 bushels of oats ; 1,247 bush- 
els of rye ; 7,973 bushels of wheat. The value of the or- 
chard productions was $7,581. Of Irish potatoes, there 
were 7,216 bushels ; sweet potatoes, 56 bushels ; hay, 1,253 
tons ; tobacco, 2,061 pounds. 



MISCELLANEOUS STATISTICS. 181 

In 1880, Tucker County had 612 horses, 57 mules, 35 
working oxen, 940 coavs, 1,451 other cattle, 3,535 sheep, 
3,655 hogs. The wool produced was 10,733 pounds, which 
was a fraction more than three pounds to the sheep. The 
production of butter was 40,592 pounds. That of cheese, 
1,846 pounds. 

The average production of butter for each farm was a 
little more than 105 poimds. The average production for 
each cow was over 43 pounds. The average for each per- 
son in the county was nearly 14 pounds. There was one 
farm to about every eight persons. There was a milch cow 
to every three and a third persons. There was a fraction 
more than three horses to every farm, and two and two- 
fifths cows to every farm, and more than nine sheep and 
nine hogs to every farm. There was less than five pounds 
of cheese produced for each farm. To each farm there were 
15 bushels of buckwheat, 165 bushels of corn, 39 bushels of 
wheat, and the orchard products averaged $19 to each farm. 
There were in the county in 1880, five manufacturing 
establishments, with a capital of $5,000, and giving employ- 
ment to ten men, with an aggregate yearly pay of $860. 
The material cost $3,660 and the manufactured goods were 
worth $5,608. The monthly pay of the men was $7.16 each. 
This was twenty-seven and a half cents a day. The manu- 
facturing of the raw material increased its value $1,948. 
This was an increase of value on the first cost, of 53 per 
cent. Each man earned about $9 per month above what he 
received as wages. The clear gain of the manufactures was 
about $1,000 per year. This was a gain of 20 per cent, on 
the capital invested. 

The assessed value of the real estate in Tucker in 1880 
was $418,703 ; that of the personal property was $60,999, 



182 HISTOEY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

total, .1479,702. The State tax was $2,035 ; county, $6,903 ; 
town, village and school district, $2,297 ; total, $11,235. In 
1880, Tucker was in debt $118. 

If the tax had been equally divided among the farms, it 
would have been $29 for each. It was $3.56 for each man, 
woman and child in the count3^ It was $18.21 for every 
voter. The tax was $2.34 on the $100. 

It ma}' not be amiss to give some scattered figures rela- 
tive to the schools of the county. In 1882, there were 96 
trustees in the county, and 15 members of the board of 
education. There were 34 school houses, of which 8 were 
made of logs and 26 were framed. There were 35 rooms in 
all. The St. George school had tAvo rooms. Of the 35 
rooms, all had desks but four, and altogether there were 117 
square yards of black-board. This was 3^ 3-ards to each 
room. All the school-houses together were valued at $6,- 
144, and the value of school lands was $367. The average 
value of the houses was $181. The school furniture was 
valued at $215, and the apparatus at $262. The total value 
of school property was $6,989. 

Between the ages of 6 and 16, there were 422 boys and 
425 girls. Over 16 and under 21, there were 146 boys and 
84 girls. Total, 1,077. Of this number, 817 attended the 
public schools. The average daily attendance was 489. 
Three-fourths of the children in the county attended school.- 
Of those enrolled, 59 per cent, attended school all the time 
during the term. During this year (1882) there were 62 
boys and 56 girls enrolled for the first time. The boys 
were tardy 75 times, and the girls 63 times. Among the 
boys there were 25 cases of truanc}^ and among the girls, 
14. The number whipped was 62 bo^'s and 66 girls. One 
girl Avas suspended from school, and no boy. Of those nei- 



^ 



MISCELLANEOUS STATISTICS. 183 

tlier absent nor tardy, there were 33 boj-s and 35 girls. The 
average age of the boys was 11 j-ears, of the girls 10 years. 
There were only two cases in which teachers were absent 
from their schools. Not a teacher in the county had at- 
tended State Normal School. Of Tucker's 30 teachers, 27 
were men and 9 were women. The men taught 82 months, the 
women 29 months. The average length, of term was 69 days. 

In Geography, there were 82, Orthograph}-, 30, English 
Grammar, 80, Arithmetic, 297, History, 37. Of the teachers, 
three men and no woman subscribed for an educational 
journal. Seven men and 3 women were teaching their first 
term. In the First Eeader, there were 93 pupils ; Second 
Eeader, 99 ; Third Eeader, 81 ; Fourth Eeader, 138 ; Fifth 
Eeader, 80; Sixth Eeader, 109. In writing there were 2S1, 
and in spelling 666. The County Superintendent made 
26 visits to the schools. The members of the board of ed- 
ucation made 70 visits, and the trustees 99. Other persons 
visited the schools 277 times. 

At the close of the last school year (1881) there was in 
the treasury, Teachers' Fund, $691. The levy on real and 
personal property was $1,334. From the State School 
Fund $841 was received. Total receipts from all sources 
for Teachers' Fund, $2,868. 

In 1882, the teachers holding No. 1 certificates received 
salaries which, in the aggregate, amounted to $787, of which 
the men got $490 and the women $297. The teachers with 
No. 2 certificates got $1,203, of which the men received 
$881 and the women $322. There were no women teaching 
on No. 3 certificates. The men on No. 3's were paid $162. 
The Sheriff received $215 for handling this money. "^Hie 
total expenditures of the Teachers' Fund amounted to 
-$2,252, and there was in the treasury a balance of $708. 



184 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

Of tlie building fund at the commencement of 1882, there 
was in the treasury (from the ])receeding 3'ear) a balance 
of $157. The levy on the total value of the property was 
$1,292. The total receipts from all sources were $1,450. 
The county paid $117 on the bonded school debt. Other 
expenditures were, for land, $15 ; for houses, $20 ; for fur- 
niture, $1.50 ; for apparatus, $35 ; total, $189. Paid $10 
for rent ; $7.80 for repairs ; $185 for fuel ; $11 as interest. 
The Sheriff's commission was $82 ; the Secretaries received 
$75. The total cost, from the Building Fund was $809. 

The Tucker County Institute that year had an attendance 
of fortj'-two, of whom thirty-six were men and six were 
women. The Institute was conducted by Prof. A. L. Fike. 
There Avas in attendance one teacher Avho had tauo;lit ten 
years or more, and nine who had taught over five years. 
The others had taught shorter terms, 1, 2, 3 and 4 years. 

At the commencement of 1877, Tucker County had on 
hand as Teachers' Fund, $273, and received from the State, 
$826, from the levy, $1,500, from other sources, $48 ; total, 
$2,709. Of the Building Fimd, there was on hand a balance 
of $809. From the levy for the Building Fund, $1,228 was 
received ; total, $2,037. Tliere was paid, for land, $10 ; f(u- 
houses, $1,004 ; for repairs, $81 ; for fuel, $84 ; for furniture, 
$35 ; for apparatus, $1.50 ; for interest, $1.50 ; for commis- 
sions, $11 ; for enrollment, $17 ; the Secretaries of boards 
of education were paid salaries to the amount of $115 ; the 
contingent expenses were $59 ; total, $1,421. 

In 1877, Tucker had 22 school-houses, of which 18 were 
frame and 4 Avere log. Three Avere not yet completed, and 
tAvo Avere completed that A'ear. The value of land Avas $227; 
that of tlie school-houses $6,257; of the furniture, $119; 
apparatus, $142 ; total, $6,745. 



MISCELLANEOUS STATISTICS. 



18; 



In the coimtv in 1877, there were 1005 school children, 
of Avhom there were 526 boys and 479 girls. Six of these 
were colored. In attendance at school there were 556, of 
whom 296 were boys, and 260 were girls. 

Tucker had that year 30 teachers, of whom 25 were men 
and 5 were women. The men taught 78 months and the 
women 14 months ; total, 92 months. The average length 
of the schools was 2.83 months. The average age of the 
boj-s at school was 10|^ years, of the girls 9f years ; general 
average, 10^ years. 

The niimber studying in each branch was as follows : Or- 
thograjihy, 546 ; Beading, 385, Writing, 298 ; Arithmetic, 
234 ; Geography, 43 ; English Grammar, 94 ; Historj', 14 ; 
Other branches, 44. Tliere were 5 Secretaries in the 
county ; 15 Commissioners ; and 25 Trustees. The County 
Superintendent made 32 visits to the schools. Other per- 
sons visited the schools 76 times ; total, 108. The average 
cost for each pupil, in 1877, was $13.50. 

A complete list of the teachers of the count}' from its 
first organization to the present time would prove interest- 
ing to so few, and is so hard to compile, that it is omitted, 
and in its stead is given the name and grade of each teacher 
of the count}' since 1876. The Superintendents of that time 
have been W. B. Maxwell, L. S. Auvil and J. M. Shafer. 

LIST OF TKACHKRS. 

1877. 

C. yi. Moore 
Wlss Agnes Gilmore 
:\ilss Lizzie Parkey 
L. S. Poling 
E. C. ]\looie 
J. W. Freeman 
J. W. Lsinibert 
M. C. Feather 
J. M. Sharer 



NUMBEK ONE. 

S. L. Stalnaker 
Lloyd Hansford 
S. N. Swisher 
Miss Jennie Maxwell 
Mrs. A. T). Adams 
J. P. Call 

NUMBER TWO. 

J. T. Mason 
Miss S. V. Garner 
Thomas Marsh 
J. S. Poling 



NUMBER THKEE. 

G. W. Shirk 
A. Hudkins 
J. G. Digmau 



Miss M. C. Purkey 
G. W. Day 
L. E. Goff 
K. F. Harris 
Charles Skidmore 
I. P. Propst 
A. G. Lambert 
Talhott Ferguson 
,r. W. Moore 
D. L. Dumire 
Miss S. C. Liston 

NUMBER FOUR 

Miss r. L. Mason 






186 



HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 



NUMBEK ONE. 

N. D. Adams 
S. N. Swisher 
J. 11. .Suyder 

NUMBER TV.'O. 

T. G. Panels 
L. E. Gainer 
L. E. Goll 
E. C. Moore 
J. T. Mason 
J. M. Sliafer 
L. S. Copper 
Miss Leiie Lynn 
G. Y. Day 



1878. 

.r. M. Strahln 
.f. c. Roby 
A. il. Stemple 

NUMBER THRES. 

.T. B. Blackman 

A. Moore 

S. P. Hayes 

o. L. Phillips 

.1. s. Polinj,^ 

J. S. D. Bell 

R. P. Harris 

J. F. Jewel 

Miss Lizzie Purkey 

Miss A. G. Gllmore 

Geoi-ge W. White 



s. c. Baker 
G. W. Shaffer 
J. B. Lambert 

NUMBER FOUR. 

L. W. Harris 
P. Y. Kunner 
J. T. Shaffer 
.1. H. M ester 
Frank Ashby 
s. P. Hayes 
Talbott Fescfuson 
<^. yy. Shaffer 
Mary James 
C. S. Watson 



, 



NUMBER ONE. 

J. M. Shafer 
Miss A. E. Fansler 
Miss M. A. Gutherle 
J. A. Swisher 
:m. L. ^Vhlte 
U. A. Hooton 

NUMBER TWO. 

Isaac Hetrie 
S. C. Baker 
G. N. Day 
L. E. Goff 



1879. 

W. Bennett e 
G. W. Shafer 
James Poling 
J. P. Auvll 
J. W. Moore 
J. H. Snydei- 
G. W. Stalnaker 
J. C. S. Bell 
P. C. Braclshaw 
J. B. Lambert 
a. W. Shirk 
>liss Lizzie Purkey 
Miss Agnes Gllmore 
:\llss A. F. Bowman 
Mrs. s. V. .Mester 



NUMBER THREE. 

J. N. Huffman 
J. D. Stalnaker 
a. K. Philips 

C. L. Watson 

D. W. Wright 
Mrs. :m. m. Class 
G. Furguson 

NUMBER FOUR. 

S. F. Hart 



NUMBER ONE. 

J. A. Swisher 
M. A. Gutheile 
J. B. Cox 
J. M. Shafer 

NUMBER TWO. 

H. G. Daniels 
J. L. Hfer 
P. W. Lipscomb 
S. C. Baker 



1880. 

H. :M. Godwin 
Isabel Pai'sons 
C. W. Long 
A. C. Dumlre 
L. W. James 
Carrie Parsons 
W. B. Jenkins 
(.1. S. Poling 
Alice Hansford 
S. S. Roderick 
S. H. (iodwln 
J. F. Hunt 
G. W. Shaffer 



Vance Graham 
S. J. Posten 
IT. G. Hartley 
Lewis Johnson 

NUMBER THREE. 

T. H. Goff 
R. ]{. Philips 
F. M. Arnett 
J. L. Wince 
A. E. Poellng 
Mary James 



NUMBER ONE. 

A. G. Flke 
J. A. Swisher 
Stuart "W'llworth 
Julia M. Evans 
Hu Maxwell 
W. C. Parsons 
S. Yoreuts 

NUMBER TWO. 

G. w. James 
Eliza Parsons 



NUjrBER ONE. 

Hu Maxwell 



1881. 

(izella Hansford 
Alice Hansford 
W. B. Jenkins 
P. W. Lipscomb 
Carrie l^arsons 
1). W. Ryan 
C. W. Long 
Mary James 
Kate Dumlre 
Isabel Parsons 
A. E. Poling 
(i. A. Goff 
H. J. Dumlre 
G. E. (ioff 

1883. 

Kate Dumlre 
H J Dumlre 
Charles V. Adams 



s. C. Barker 
James Boner 
J. H. Snyder 
.L F. Hunt 
.1. S. Cornwell 
A. S. Hough. 

NUMBER THREE. 

S. M. Adams 
1). W. Wright 
F. M. Arnett 
J. H. cordray 
It. K. Philips. 



Carrie Parsons 
C. W. Long 
Joseph Selby 



MISCELLANEOUS STATISTICS. 



187 



NUMBER TWO. 

Ozena Hansford 
Eliza Parsons 
W. J. James 
P. W. Lipscomb, 
L. H. Goff, 
li. W. James, 
D. W. Ryan 



NTIMIiER ONE. 

Jesse G. Vanscoy 
Carrie Parsons 
EUza Pareons 
M. J. Fansler 
C. H. Streets 
C. W. Adams 
S. M. Adams 



Samantha Dumlre 
A. C. Poling 
Alclnda Shaler 
.J. L. Philips 
s. M. Adams 
J. E. Mason 
Guy P. Schoonover 
Jotin- F. Hunt 



188.3. 

E. J. Domii-e 
R. K. PhllUps 
J. L. Phillips 
J H. Moore 
W. R. Shaffer 
J. F. Hunt 
W. P. Jett 

F. M. A. Lawson 
C. C. Douglas 

G. W. Shirk 
G. W. Shafer 
Alclnda Shafer 
1). W. Wright 



Alice Hansford 
W. S. Godwin 
L. W. >:ester 
X. C. Lamhert 
J. B. Lamheit 
A. Y. Lambert 
\\\ A. Ault 
W. B. Ault 



Lizzie Purkey 

hXMBER THREE 

M. J. Harris 
A. J. Douglas 
D. B. Smith 
G. B. Skidmore 



^X1IBER TWO. 

David Long 

Some may lincl interest in looking over a few scraps of 
statistics, selected at random from old reports. 

In 1867, the levy for the Building Fund in Tucker was 
only $250, and the receipts from it reached only $25. Noth- 
ing was received from any other source. Nothing was ex- 
pended. The reports detail nothing, if there were any 
transactions in this business. The County Sux)erintendent 
got $108.33. No other officers got anything. 

At that time, 1867, Tucker had 17 districts, with two 
frame houses and ten log houses for schools. The average 
value was $92 ; the aggregate value $1,275. There were 
ten schools taught, and in attendance there were 348 boys 
and 340 girls, total, 688. There were ten teachers, nine of 
w^hom were men. The average salary of the men was $23 
per month ; the woman received $18. The general average 
of the wages was $22.5 per month.^ There were sixteen 
applicants examined. Two failed to get certificates. One 
person got a No. 1 certificate ; the rest got lower grades. 
From the general school fund, in 1867, Tucker got $733. 

As documents only, the Eeports of the County Superin- 



• The state Superintendent's Report places the general average at $21 ; and, lor his 
deficiency in arithmetic, he may stand corrected. 



188 HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

tendents of 18G7 and 1877 are given. A decided improve- 
ment diTi'iug the intervening ten years may be noticed ; but 
the school interests of the county have gone forward more 
since 1877 than during the ten years next preceding. 

It may be of interest to some to see side b}' side the Re- 
ports of the County Superintendents of Tucker for two 
years. For this purpose the Reports of 1867 and 1877 are 
given as follows : 

TUCKER COUNTY.— 1867. 

The school nysteui is not receiving as hearty a welcome as it de- 
serves. There are many Avho are bitterly complaining of its gen- 
eral principles ; that it is not acceptable to the rural districts. 
The country is very thinly settled, and the school districts are 
very large. The school-houses are few. Taxation is oppressive, 
and many live too remote from the school-houses to receive any 
advantage from them. They have their prof)ortion of the tax to 
pay, and their children are wholly deprived of schools. These par- 
ties should of right be exempt from the school tax. Of the three 
townships into which this county is divided, two (Hannahsville 
and Black Fork) levied a tax sufficient to continue the schools four 
months or longer. St. George township refused to luake any levy 
for school or for building purposes. 

The schools that were taught last winter did well. In the winter 
of 1865-6 the boards of education in their respective townships put 
in operation many more schools than the funds under their con- 
trol would sustain, thus incurring a heavj' indebtedness on the 
townships. This policy was a bad one, and produced unfavorable 
results. I think the boards are guarding against this evil for the 
future. But little is said or done as yet in the Avay ot putting 
schools in operation. Some districts are beginning to move in that 
direction, and I hope for favorable results. 

A. H. BowMAX, County Supt. 

TUCKER COUNTY.— 1877. 

In submitting this, my second annual report, I have the satisfac- 
tion of knowing that the same is substantially correct, although 
there ai^pears to be some difference between the columns of receipts 



MISCELLANEOUS STATISTICS. 189 

and expenditures as against the balances, yet this rises from the 
fact that tlie Secretaries have counted as balances the amount in 
tlie Sheriff's hands at his setclement with the County Court at the 
June term, 1877 ; whereas, at that time tliere was a large number 
of orders for money outstanding, which outstanding o)*ders were 
reckoned by the Seci*etaries as expenditures. The boards have no 
means of knowing what claims are outstanding, or what paid only 
as they can get it from the Clerk of the County Court ; the Sheriff 
of this county having hitherto wholly neglected to settle with the 
boards. However, this will be remedied by the late amendments 
to the school law. 

In my opinion, the repoi't required of Secrettiries might be made 
less complicated, and yet contain all the necessary matter required 
to give proper date, &c. Our county imports too many teachers 
from other counties, and even from other states. AVhen we have 
more resident teachers, it will be better for us. 

All the boards of education, at the beginning of the school year, 
passed orders that they would allow nothing for sweeping and 
building fires. The result was a suit in which the court decided 
that as the boards have general supervision of school matters, that 
such an order may be made. While the attendance upon our 
schools the past year has not been as large as might have been 
wished for, yet it must be kept in mind that our county is thinly 
inhabited, and that many of the pupils have to travel three or four 
miles to get to the nearest school house. But, regardless of this 
and other difficulties, our people have become firmly endeared to 
our school system. As a rule, there appears to be a steady im- 
l^rovement in our teachers year by year. 

All of which is respectfully submitted. 

W. B. Maxwell, County Sap't. 



CHAPTER XI. 
NEWSrAPFBS OF THE COUNTY. 

On November 22, 1878, appeared the first copy of the 
Tucker County Pioneer^' It was edited by Charles L. Bow- 
man, and was printed every Friday morning at St. George. 
The subscription rate was one doUar per ^ear. It was the 
first paper published in the county, and its need was felt by 
the people. The paper had a " patent " side, printed in 
New York. In politics, the paper was independent. It 
claimed to represent the best interests of Tucker Coiinty. 

The first issue was of three hundred copies. Within a 
week two hundred and fifty subscribers were obtained. 
Since then, the subscription has ranged from three hundred 
and fifty to seven hundred names. 

During the remaining weeks of 1878, and the year 1879, 
the Pioneer flourished, with nothing to interrupt its success. 
It was supported by Democrats and Eepublicans alike ; and 
its corps of correspondents consisted of the best talent in 
the county. 

1880 was an election 3'ear, and in Tucker County, local 
politics ran high. There soon became room for contention, 
and the Democrats split their party into two factions, one 
known as Independents and the other as Conventionals. 



*As long ago as 186!), an effort Avas made to start a newspaper In St. George. 
W. Scott Garner, of I'reston County, endeavored to form a Joint stock company for 
tliat purpose, but the amount subscribed was Insufficient, and Mr. Garner returned 
to Kingwood, where ho engaged In journalism, and establlslied a "Tucker County 
Department" in his paper. The name, Tucker Connlii Pioneer, was first used by 
Mr. Garner, In connection with a manuscript paper started by hhn in the winter of 
1874-5, while teaching the White Oak School, a sliort distance above St. George. This 
paper was read every Friday afternoon, during the regular literary exercises. 



NEWSPAPERS. 191 

Old family feuds were probabl}' at tlie bottom of it all ; and 
this family quarrel was carried to sncli an extent tliat it 
became incorporated with and lost in the political issues. 

One wing of the Democrats favored a convention to nom- 
inate county officers, while the other wing opposed it 
as unn.ecessar3\ Contrariness Avas more of a faction in these 
issues than real policy ; but, still, the Conventionals went 
ahead in their plans for a convention. 

The Pioneer was opposed to the convention from the 
very first, and waged an uncompromising war against it. It 
claimed that there was no occasion for it, and that it would 
excite an opposition that would divide the Democratic 
party, and split the political solidity of our county into 
fragments. But, there was much room for difference of 
opinion, and the partisans of the convention went forward 
in their work, and called the convention together on the 
twenty-first of June, 1880. They put their ticket in the 
field. The forebodings seemed ominous from the very first; 
for, a murmur of dissatisfaction went up from every part 
of the county. The men put in nomination were evidently 
not the choice of the majority of the people. 

The convention now began to be called a clique or ring. 
The Pioneer o-pposed every man put in nomination ; and, 
among the conventionals, the want of a nev;spaper began to 
be felt. It was this occasion that called the Turl,!er Dem- 
ocrat into existence. On August 12, 1880, it arrived in St. 
George, having been removed from Taylor County, West 
Virginia, where it had been in existence a year under the 
name of the J^eio Era, owned by Messrs. J. P. Scott and 
• M. J. Bartlett. The press on which it Avas printed was 
thought to be the oldest in the State, having first been used 
in Charleston. Soon after the arrival of the press at St. 



192 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

George, Scott sold his interest to Lloyd Hansford and L. S. 
Auvil. The paper supjiorted the convention and the nomi- 
nees, and was supposed by its supporters to be Democratic. 
The contention between the two papers, and the two fac- 
tions, grew mdre determined each day. Never in the history 
of the county had a campaign been fought with such ani- 
mosity. A. B. Parsons was the nominee for the office of 
Prosecuting Attorney, and P. Lipscomb was the Lidepend- 
ent. William E. Talbott was the nominee for sheriff, 
opposed by A. C. Minear, Lidependent. The hardest fight 
was for these offices, but the contest for the others was 
bitter in the extreme. 

The Democrat labored under disadvantages. Its outfit of 
machinery and material was defective and incomplete, and 
it found much difficulty in its press work. However, it 
kept steadily at work for a cause that was plainly losing 
ground. The Ptoiieer, under the editorial management of 
C. L. Bowman, grew in circulation and influence. Its sub- 
scribers at this time amounted to over seven hundred, while 
that of the Democrat was considerably less than half that 
number. 

As the election drew near, the excitement rose to fever 
heat, and there was scarcely a voter in the county who did 
not feel a personal interest in tlie contest. Everybody 
seemed waiting and anxious for the final struggle, which, as 
they said, must decide whether the convention or the voters 
were to be umpire in Tucker County. Wc are to jiidge the 
justness of the issues by the result; for, in a republican 
country, as long as it remains a republic, the majority must 
rule. 

The election came at last ; and the resiilt Avas an over- 
whelming victory for the Independents, the party of the 



NEWSPAPERS. 



193 



^oneer. That paper, in its succeeding issue, carried its 
exultation ^dtli a great manifestation of triumph, and dis- 
played in its columns cuts and representations of the vic- 
tors and the vanquished. There were a number of cuts, but 
the following reproduction of one of them will give an idea 
of their character : 




The following poem was written for the occasion by some 
wag, and found its way into the columns of the Pioneer. It 
represents, in an allegorical manner, the campaign and the 
defeat of the modern Hohenlinden : 



Vi 



194 HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY 

BATTLE OF ST. GEORGK. 

J^xoritur clamorqne virum clangorquc tuharum. 

In Tucker when the sun was low, 
Beside Mill Run's chub-breeding flow, 
There was a rather ghostly show, 
A shoAv of dire iumiensity. 

For, candidates from near and far 
Had gathered on the gravel-bar ; 
Their faces were as black as tar 
With hate and animosity. 

"With muttering rage they seemed to choke. 
And wildly shrieked '-anioke ! amoke !* 
As fierce the storm with fury broke 
Upon the vast menagerie. 

Soon they began to whoop and tear. 
And grab each other by the hair 
And dash them on the ground and swear 
In blood-emblazoned revelry. 

On high above the battle plain 
The gravel stones flew up amain 
As thick as fell the iron rain 

Upon the hills of (xettysburg. 

Then Bowman t looking from his den. 
Beheld the awful mess of men, 
And wished that he had never been 
A Tucker County editor. 

He gazed about the field of gore 
Like Neptune gazed the ocean o'er : 
He fainted on the office floor 

Like Neptune's nephew, Mulciber. 

More horrid still the battle grew. 
They mauled each other black and l)lue 
And tore the very sky in two 

With yells and screams and bellowings. 

Some groveled on the gory ground 
Amid the thumping thump and pound, 
And some went spiiniing round and rounil 
Like crippled flies and whirligigs. 

* A Kamr -n-ord meaning " kill." 

t C. L. Bowman, etUtoi' ot the Pioneer. 



NEWSPAPEKS. 195 

And some, the little ones they say, 
Got kicked in that fantastic fray 
Up nearly to the Milky Way, 
And twice as high as Jupiter. 

And some, the bigger ones 'tis said. 
Got whacked and cracked across the head 
With broken rails and slugs of lead 
Until they wailed most balefully. 

The middle-sized, the story runs. 
Went whizzing like the powder tuns 
At Shipka Pass, when gattling guns 
Belched forth their nitro-glycerine. 

Yet, deeper grew the dreadful war, 
And woe betide the gravel-bar ! 
It looked like Conkling while Lemar 
Was handling him at Washington. 

'Twas dug and heaved in mighty piles, 
Like Borneo's volcanic isles. 
They heard the rumpus many miles. 
They say 'twas heard in Beverly. 

But, when the evening sun was down 
No candidate Avas left to frown 
In Tucker County's only town ; 

They all had perished manfully. 

Their blood was hot and they were brave ; 
They fought their pickled pork to save ; 
They fought for office or their grave 
And'perished on the gra,vel-bar. 

Then people came with faces blank 
And hauled them like a load of plank 
And dumped them o'er the river bank 
While Bowman sang their obsequies. 

The election was not a surprise ; bnt, it set heavily upon 
the defeated candidates. The people throughout the 
county seemed to feel relief that it was past. The Pioneer 
came out with a "patent side," and the Democrat sus- 
pended publication, and got out a paper only once in sev- 
eral weeks, until February 14, 1881, when William M. Cay- 



196 HISTOPvT OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

ton arrived to take charge of it. It was now owned princi- 
pally by a stock company, and was in a deplorable condi- 
tion. Its circulation was very limited, and its press and 
type insufficient. 

W. M. Cayton was born in Upslinr County, West Vir- 
ginia, 1862 ; moved when very young to Parkersburg, and 
thence to Cincinnati, where he remained eight years. He 
then returned to Harrison County, West Virginia, and re- 
mained there four years, part of the time in the office of 
the Clarhsbuag News. February 14, 1881, he came to St. 
George, and has since edited the Democrat, and has built 
up the financial condition of the paper to some extent. 
The Democrat has passed through many vicissitudes of for- 
tune. It came to supply a need that was not extensively 
felt, and for that reason its support has not been as exten- 
sive and uniform as its proprietors could wish. At times, 
too, its editorial management has not been excellent, for, at 
times, it was not paying property, and a good editor would 
not stick to it. In politics it claims to uphold the principles 
of Democracy; but, its extreme views, and its uncompro- 
mising opposition to all who differ from it, have had a ten- 
dency to build up the Republican party in- the county, and 
its work in that direction, though unintentional on its part, 
has been greater than it has to build up the cause of the 
Democrats. 

The party which it represented, the conventional, car- 
ried the election of 1882, and the victory had a tendency to 
build up the cause of the Democrat, and placed it on a 
firmer footing than it ever was before. 

The Pioneer has passed through no such vicissitudes. 
Since its first issue it has gone steadily forward, or, at least, 
has never retrograded. Its financial success has not been 



NEWSPAPEES. 197 

immense ; but, it has always been able to keep in the field 
without the aid of a stock company — except, at the very 
first, when it received some support from individuals, all of 
which was paid back as borrowed money. The paper's in- 
fluence in the county has been permanent. It is independ- 
ent in politics, and has aimed principally to build up the 
county, socially and financially. 

In February, 1884, it was bought by Hu Maxwell, Cyrus 
H. Maxwell and Jeff Lipscomb. "Within a few weeks Lips- 
comb sold his interest to the other members of the firm. In 
politics it still represented no ]5arty to the exclusion of 
others. 

The benefit that Tucker County has gained from the two 
papers has been considerable. Nearly every family in the 
county reads either one or the other of them, and the influ- 
ence for good must be felt. There is room for the papers 
to extend their influence, and they surely will within the 
course of a few more years. They should be co-partners 
with the schools and churches in guarding and advancing 
the public good. 



CHAPTER XII. 
TILE ST. (JKonGE BAIL 

Although we have no forensic eloquence to rival Henry 
and Cicero, yet our county lias its legal ability, and as such 
it is not afraid or ashamed to place it before the State as a 
competitor in the courts against the lawyers from any part 
of AVest Virginia. Our little Court-house has been the 
scene of contention, argument and debate, in which not 
only our own lawyers, but those from other counties, have 
met at the bar, and fought for justice, or parleyed over legal 
technicalities. It is not more than is due these gentlemen 
that they be given a i^lace in histor}-, to which their pro- 
fession and labors in the cause of right so undoubtedly and 
so justly entitle them. 

WILLIAM EWIN. 

Hon. "William Ewin, of Irish nativit}^ has, for nearly 
forty years, been a lawyer, practicing in Tucker since its 
organization, and living here for more than ten years 
before. His ability as a lawyer has long been recognized, 
not only in his own county, but in neighboring counties, 
and, in a measure, throughout the State. His education 
and general intelligence have made him prominent in his 
profession, and he has ever been among the first to investi- 
gate new subjects and to acquaint himself with them. At 
the bar, he would not condescend to unmanly abuse or 
resort to chicanery to gain an advantage over' a rival. If 
lie could not succeed by fair, honest and honorable means, 
he preferred failure. An honest defeat, with him, was bet- 



THE ST. GEOEGE BAR. 199 

ter than a dishonest victory. Opponents in°arguement and 
debate were treated with all the respect of colleagues. In 
this was one of the secrets of his success as a lawyer. It 
was known that what he said was uninfluenced by prejudice 
or partisanism, and he was taken at his word. 

That his legal ability was known and appreciated by the 
people of his county is attested by the confidence which 
they have ever placed in him. ' They have bestowed upon 
liiui various offices of trust, feeling fully assured that no 
scheme of gain or no party preference could influence him 
from the field of honor and duty. Confidence placed in him 
was by him regarded sacred ; and, in all the official acts of 
his life there is not one instance where he departed or de- 
viated from the course marked out by his sense of honor. 

If every bar in the State and country could feel the influ- 
ence of one or more such men as Senator Ewin, the legal 
profession would soon enjoy an elevation above that which 
is consequent upon a scramble and contention for gain, no 
matter by what means it is to be reached ; there would be 
one more step gained in the general cause of advancement, 
which is marking the present era in our history and has 
marked the eras of the jxist ; which is separating dignity 
and honor from infamy and fraud, and lifting this noble 
profession, the noblest, perhaps, of the world, above that 
baseness to which the tendency of the age has, at times, 
seemed disposed to lower it. 

HUFUS MAXWELL. 

In the earliest years of Tucker County, Rufus Maxwell 
was one of the most active members of tlie bar. He had 
practiced at Weston, in Lewis County, before that time, 
and had there quite an extensive business. AVhen he came 



200 HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

to Tucker, it was a jiart of Eandolpli, the separation not 
yet having taken place. He was with those who worked for 
the new county, and when at length, on March 6, 1856, the 
Act of the Legislature creating the county was passed, he 
was material in assisting to organize the functions of gov- 
ernment and justice for the new county. Owing to some 
imperfections in the Act, this was a difficult task, and it re- 
quired mucli labor from those who had undertaken it and 
who had it to do. 

Mr. Maxwell was the first Prosecuting Attorney of Tucker 
County, having been elected in 1856. He held the office 
four years, and, in the election of 1860, was re-elected over 
Thomas Rummell, who was at that time a well-known law- 
yer of our county. In 1861, the war came on, and the 
affairs of our county were in a bad fix. "We were often 
under neither Federal nor Confederate government ; but 
each claimed jurisdiction over us, and the result was that 
at times we were under rule little better than anarchic. 
Officers had no power to execute the functions of their 
offices ; and, rather than hold a trust over which iliej had 
not jurisdiction, many of our county officers resigned, and 
let tilings take their course, as they would anyhow. Among 
those who thus retired was Eufus Maxwell. He retired not 
only from the office of Prosecuting Attorne}^ but also from 
the profession of the law. It had grown distasteful to him, 
and from that time he had nothing more to do with it. 

A. v.. PAJtSONS. 

Hon. A. B. Parsons stands before the people principall}^ 
as a land and criminal lawyer, although in chancery practice 
his business is extensive. He is most successful before a 
jury. He has studied well the modes of presenting an ar- 
gument in the most forcible manner, and in this he has 



THE ST. GEORGE BAE. 201 

hardly an equal and no superiors in this or the neighboring 
counties. 

In his early life he was a farmer and school teacher ; but, 
in 1870, in his twenty-sixth year, he commenced reading - 
law, and was admitted to the bar at St. George in 1872. In 
1876 he was elected Prosecuting Attorney and served four 
years, having succeeded Hon. William Ewiu in the office. 
In 1880 he was instrumental in the organization of the 
Democratic party in Tucker County. In 1882 he was elected 
from Tucker and Randolph to the Legislatui'e, by sixty-eight 
majority over three Democrats and a prominent Republican. 
The several offices which he has held have not, in a great 
measure, kept him from his legal profession, although he 
has filled such offices with honor and ability. Scarcely a 
case comes before the Court in which he is not a counsel 
for one side or the other. His ]oractice extends through 
the courts from the bench of the Justice to the Supreme 
Court of Appeals of West Virginia. 

In the cause of the State against Heath, a well-known case, 
Mr. Parsons was counsel for the defendant, and gained the 
suit, which was taken from Tucker to Taylor Count3\ His 
first case commenced before a Justice and was decided in 
the Circuit Coui-t. In the Supreme Court his practice has 
been extensive. His practice extends to the Circuit Courts 
in several of the counties of West Virginia.* 

LLOYD HANSFORD. 

As a lawyer Mr. Hansford has only a short record, hav- 
ing so recently entered the profession. But, in his qualifi- 
cations he starts none behind his competitors and col- 
leagues at the bar. A scholar of finished education, he be- 

*See Brtef Biograpliles. 



202 HISTOEY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

gins with fewer disadvantages than many whose educations 
are more limited. He is the only graduate in Tucker 
County from the State Normal School, and was our first 
graduate from any State school. He graduated in 1879, in 
his twenty-second year. 

In 1880 he went to Clarksburg and studied law under 
Caleb Boggess. After six months he returned to Tucker, 
but still continued the study of law, and at regular times 
returned to Clarksburg to recite to Boggess. On the first 
of Januar}^, 1884, he received license to practice law, having 
been examined b}"- Judges Boyd, Jacobs and Fleming.* 

L. S. AUVIL. 

As a law3-er, L. S. Auvil is only a few months the senior 
of Lloyd Hansford, having obtained his license to practice, 
in May, 1883, after two years study of the law. He was 
examined before Judges Ice, Boj'd and Jacobs. He was in 
his twenty-ninth 3'ear when he obtained license to practice. 
He had, before that time, served several years as County 
Superintendent of Tucker. Since he entered the profession 
of law, he has been successful in every particular, and has 
been counsel in several important cases. He was at one 
time editor of the Tucker County Democrat, which paper he 
sold to William Cayton, and turned his attention wholly to 
the law. t 

W\ B. MAXWELL. 

On August 31, 1874, W. B. Maxwell received license to 
practice law, having been examined before Judges C. S. 
Lewis, John Brannon and J. S. Huffman. He had been 
studying law three years, and had made himself thoroughly 
acquainted with the forms and technicalities of the law be- 

• For a lurtlier sketch of Mr. Haiisford see " Brief Hlograpliles." 
t See "Brief Biographies." 




X 



W. B. Maxwell. 



^ 



THE ST. GEORGE BAR. 203 

fore he presumed to enter into the profession. He had 
spent several years attending school at Morgantown, "Weston 
and Clarksburg, and, at that time, was regarded as the most 
finely educated man in the county. 

Having gained an important case before Justice William 
Talbott, at the first of his professional life — it was his very 
first case — he established or won a reputation at once as a 
lawyer of ability. His practice soon became considerable ; 
and he followed up his first success with a series of others, 
so that, ere long, he had gained for himself a permanent 
practice. 

He has never particularly studied to become a criminal 
lawyer. It is not to him the most desirable branch of the 
profession ; although, in numerous cases which have been 
entrusted to him he has proven himself possessed of the 
characteristics that go to make up a ciiminal lawyer of the 
first class. 

The main set of his inclination is toward civil cases ; and 
in this his superior, considering his age, perhaps, cannot be 
found in West Virginia. 

To understand and bring into practice the principles of 
the common law seem natural to him. He has made him- 
self the master of Blackstone, Kent, Tucker, Minor, Jones, 
and other lawyers who have penetrated unexplored fields. 

As a sj)eaker he stands pre-eminent. None of his col- 
leagues surpass him in this. With a clear voice and a dis- 
tinct articulation, he s^^eaks with a natural earnestness and 
force that surpasses all that artificial culture could do. The 
juries whom he addresses forget the man in the subject, 
and hear not the words so much as the meaning that is in 
them. He never appeals to passion or depends upon mo- 
mentary excitement for success. He relies upon sober rea- 



204 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

son to decide for liim. If, in the course of an address, he 
finds that his Jury have been placed under the influence of 
furor or undue enthusiasm, it is his first study to lead 
them back again to a normal mood, then to appeal to their 
natural reason and understanding. 

No lawyer of Tucker County has, or ever has had, a more 
extensive practice than he. His business is large and is 
fast increasing in the Supreme Court of Appeals of the 
State. In chancery practice he is eminently successful, and 
at such business he has no peer at this bar. The suits of 
the large land-holders are placed in his hands, and the 
j)artj who can secure his services considers himself fortu- 
nate. He has never allowed politics to interfere with his 
profession, although his political ability is scarcely second 
to his ability in the law. At the age of thirty, he finds him- 
self not only at the head of the legal profession of his 
county, but also well established in neighboring counties, 
and recognized throughout the State. 

p. LIPSCOMB. 

The present Prosecuting Attorney of Tucker County has 
biiilt for himself a business and worked himself into a 
practice that speaks plainly of his success in the law. He 
is a self-educated man ; and, by his own exertions he has 
built his own business. He first filled the ofiice of County 
Superintendent of schools for Tucker County, and reduced 
our school system to more order than it was ever in before. 
During this time he was zealously j)rosecuting his stud}- of 
the law, and was making good progi*ess. But, it was even 
several years before this that he obtained license to practice. 
He established himself at St. George, and was the only 
lawyer there. Mr. Ewin resided near the town, but not in 
it. The town, too, was then much smaller than it is now, 



THE ST. GEOKGE BAR. 205 

and there was little business done. Bat, wlien tlie term of 
Circuit Court came, business grew more lively, and the law- 
yers found more to occupy them. 

Lipscomb did not confine his practice to Tucker County, 
even at the first. He practiced in the Maryland Court, at 
Oakland, in Garrett County, and had nearly as mvich bus- 
iness there as in his own county. His greatest success has 
ever been in jury practice. He well understands the argu- 
ments that will persuade and convince, and he knows just 
to what men each order of argument is most applicable. In 
his style of speech he is more practical than theatrical. 
He speaks to the point, and is not so particular as to the 
words used. He never fails to arrest and hold the attention 
of a jury. 

Of course, a lawyer of this kind will be more or less suc- 
cessful in criminal practice ; and, a criminal case seldom 
comes before the court that is not represented on one side 
or the other by Lipscomb. In the memorable campaign of 
1880, he was elected to the office of Prosecuting Attorney, 
and held the office four years.* 

* See " Brief Biographies " for additional matter on the lawyers of Tucker County. 



CHAPTER XIII. 

TEA YELEBS. 

Without official records to show that such is the case, it 
is still safe to say that no county of West Virginia has, in 
proportion to its poj)ulation, furnished more emigrants to 
the western country than Tucker has furnished. Tlie rea- 
son of this may be tM'o-fold. If the first would argue that 
our county's resources are not such as invite development, 
the second -wdll make it plain that our people are possessed 
witli that energy and industry that will search the remotest 
corners of a continent for the most favorable openings for 
labor. The hills and valleys of Cheat have furnished scores 
and hundreds of honest men, Avho are now building up with 
the West. There is hardly a state, probably not a state, 
west of the Ohio Eiver that has not inhabitants from 
'Cucker. These and their descendants, if now brought back 
to this county, would probably double its population foiu' 
times. Recenth- at the golden wedding of Abraham Par- 
sons, Esq., in the Salinas Valley, California, there were 
present one hundred persons who, or whose parents, were 
from Tucker. Nearly all of them belonged to the Parsons 
family, and had left Cheat Eiver within the past twenty 
years. Yet, this is onl}- an instance that could be equaled 
by other states. 

It is not the plan of these chapters to deal at length Avith 
Tucker's people now in distant states ; but, as it is intended 
to give a history of our people, it seems proper to make 
mention of those who have taken up their residence else- 
where. But such mention must be brief, and will be con- 



TRAVELERS. 207 

fined to those only who are particiUarly remembered here, 
or to those whose travels and adventures chiim especial 
attention. It is clearly to be seen that, as travelers and 
adventurers, the principal characters are found in the Mi- 
near, Parsons, Harper and Bonnifield families. It will 
likewise be noticed that Tucker County's travelers traveled 
for the most part over the Western States and California ; 
but some have been in the West Indies, Mexico, South 
America and the South Sea Islands, as well as in British 
America and on the Alaskan coast. 

Of the travelers of Tucker, none are more extensively 
known than Abe Bonnifield. He has been a traveler all his 
life, although he has never been in foreign countries but 
once. It is estimated that he has ridden on horseback 
seventy-five thousand miles. More than enough to take 
him round the world three times. He was born in 1837, on 
Horse Shoe Run, and has considered that his home ever 
since. As is well known to all who will be likely to read 
this book, he was born without legs. He learned self -loco- 
motion as young as other children ; and when he v,'as quite 
small, he could run and ride and swim as well as au}- of the 
boys of the neighborhood. His early life ran quiet ; and 
during the winter he attended school, and in the summer 
trained pet crows to stand on one foot, and harnessed liz- 
zards and crawfish together to see which could pull the 
hardest. At school, he led his classes, particularly in math- 
ematics, in which, like his father, Dr. Arnold Bonnifield, he 
was very apt. 

It is not the purpose to give a lengthy account of his life; 
since he has been for 3-ears engaged upon his autobiogra- 
phy, and the book will prol)ably be published soon. These 
chapters have particularly in view the collecting of material 



208 HISTOEY OF TUCKEK COUNTY. 

that seems likely soon to be lost or forgotten ; and, as Mr. 
Bonnifield will publish all that relates to himself, it appears 
unnecessary to give a very full account here. He has given 
the writer access to his manuscripts, and from them the 
facts here given have been mostly taken. 

He remained at home till his twentieth year, except an 
occasional visit through the eastern and western counties 
of "West Virginia. He began to be moved by a desire for 
travel. He thought of Missouri, then considered a far 
western country ; and on January 13, 1856, he left the home 
of his childhood and went forth into the wide world. His 
brother David accompanied him. They went to "Wheeling, 
thinking to pass down the Ohio River, thence up the 
Mississippi and Missouri. While they were making ar- 
rangements for the descent, they met Mr. A. J. Mayo, who 
was the manager of a traveling show that was famous in its 
day. He prevailed on the two Bonnifield boys to accom- 
pany him. This seemed a fair chance to see the world, and 
Bonnifield accepted it, and gave up the project of going 
down the Ohio River. From "Wheeling, the show went to 
Zanesville, and from Zanesville to Newark, and from New- 
ark to Columbus. By this time Bonnifield began to get 
tired of being hauled about in truck wagons. Accordingly, 
he deserted the show, and spent some time trapping musk- 
rats along the rivers, and was nearly down to Cincinnati 
on the Little Miami. But, at Columbus he joined another 
show and was ready for more trundling about. This time 
he was with Carbin and Denoon's Indian Troup. He 
traveled up and down over almost every mile of Ohio, and 
then passed into Indiana, and visited all the principal 
places in that state. He was not favorably impressed with 
the people whom he met there, if we may judge from his 



TEAVELEKS. 209 

letters and journal written on the ground. When he got 
into Michigan he began to be more favorably impressed 
with the country and people. 

The main feature of the show Avas the Indians. They 
soon became fast friends with Bonnifield, and would do 
whatever he told them to. By taking advantage of this, he 
created a big disturbance in camp one night. The Indians 
were lounging about on their blankets, some asleep and 
others not, when he offered three cents to one if he would 
bite the chief's toe off. The chief Avas asleep, but his toe 
protruded from under the blanket. The Indian snapped it 
up in his teeth, and probablj^ would have gotten it off' if the 
chief had not happened to awake at that moment, and set 
up a terrible yelling and flouncing about so that he pulled 
loose from the Indian's teeth. The fight became general, 
and the war-whoops rang through the town until the ]ieople 
thought the world must be coming to an end. 

He passed over into Canada, and wandered up and down 
over that desolate wilderness of pine trees. Canada was at 
that time a great rendezvous for negroes who had escaped 
from slavery in the United States. Small colonies of these 
runaways were found at intervals throughout that country. 
It was a bad place for them. The land was poor and the 
winters were long and cold. The negroes w^ere not pros- 
pering. They were too lazy to work much, and were trying 
to make a living by manufacturing soda from ashes. They 
lived in miserable log huts, and poverty and forsakenness 
was written on every door, and was visible about the prem- 
ises everywhere. " Hello there ! " said Bonnifield to an old 
negro who was trying to hoe his patch of corn, that Avas 
hardly knee-high at the middle of August. "Hello there! 
you old black scalaAvag, don't you Avisli you Avere back in 

14 



210 HISTOEY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

Vii'f^inia twistini^ tobacco for your grub?" The negro 
looked up and seemed to be startled ; then leaning lazily on 
his hoe-handle, he answered with a sigh : ""^^ Deed I does ^ 

Bonnifield got tired of show-life, and came home. His 
father was then clerk of the Circuit and County Courts of 
Tucker, and Abe took charge of the office. He was at this 
employment when the war commenced. He sympathized 
with the South ; b;it, he remained at his business in St. 
George until it began to be unsafe tliere for a southern man 
who made no secret of his opinions. On Moaday morning, 
June 10, 1861, just after daylight, about forty Yankees came 
galloping into St. George, and rummaged through the town 
in search of Rebel flags. The}- found one, or claimed they 
did, and Avith it returned in triumph to Rowlesburg. Bon- 
nifield was charged with having something to do with the 
flag, and he was warned by friends that he was not safe. 
The next we hear of him he was in the South, accompanied 
by George and Bax Kalar, "William Talbott and other 
Tucker County boys. 

He remained in the war till the last gun was fired, and 
then did not surrender, but escaped on horseback from the 
Yalley of Virginia, and Avhen the fighting was at an end he 
came home. The whole four years that he was in the army 
Avas one continued succession of adventures and dashing 
marches. He was regarded as among the very best riders 
in the Confederate cavalry. His Aveight Avas about seventy 
jiounds ; and being thus light, his horse, Avhicli Avas a power- 
ful one, was about the last to give out when it came to a 
long raid or a long retreat. He remained for the most part 
in the Yalley of Virginia ; but he was frequently in other 
parts. He accompanied the Imbodens .in some of their 
memorable raids. As he Avas ahvays in the very front in 



TRAVELEKS. 211 

every kind of adventure, he was often in the hottest part of 
the battle, and in the foremost rank of the charging col- 
umns. If he was cut off from his men, and in danger of 
being shot, he would throw himself from his horse, hang by 
his hand to the horn of the saddle on the side least exposed 
to the enemy's fire, guide his horse vrith the other hand, 
and thus escape. In the tumult of the battle the foe would 
not notice but that the horse was riderless ; and thus he 
often dashed through the very lines of the enemy unseen. 
Such was the strength of his arms that he could hang by 
them for an hour without very great fatigue. 

He was in front of the pursuit that chased Hunter, and 
was among the few, who, after a terrible night of marching 
through the wilderness, got in front of the flying army, and 
gave them the check which well nigh resulted fatally to the 
Federals. 

Bonnifield was not in the battle of Gettysburg ; but he 
joined Lee's army in its retreat before it reached the Poto- 
mac, and was with it a few days. He went back to the 
Valley, and was there when General Early, who had been 
sent to Lynchburg to drive Hunter out, came down the 
Yalley. He joined Early, and the fifteen thousand men 
moved off toward the Potomac, and chased General Sigel 
over the river into Maryland. Early set out for AYashing- 
ton, and got within five miles of the city, when he was 
obliged to retreat. Thus, Bonnifield was one of the fifteen 
thousand Eebels who got near enough to see the flag on the 
Capitol at Washington, and got away. He escaped back 
to the Yalley of Yirginia. 

When the war ended, Bonnifield returned to Horse Shoe 
Run, where he has lived ever since, although he has trav- 
eled some since then. He visited Washington a few years 



212 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

ago to press his claim for payment for cattle carried off by 
Union soldiers during the war. He spent some time at the 
National Capital, and had the satisfaction of seeing how 
near he had come to taking it during the war. 

He has a horse on which he has ridden nearly forty 
thousand miles. The horse is still living, and is now 
(1884) over twenty years of age. This horse and its 
rider are known all over the eastern part of the State ; and 
they have been out of the State more than five hundred 
times in the last twelve years. A full history of Abe Bon- 
nifield will probably soon be published ; and it will surely 
be an interesting volume. 

Several of the Bonnifields have been extensive travelers, 
although their most beaten path is to and from California. 
Mr. A. T. Bonnifield and his two sons, Henry and William, 
are not now residents of Tucker, but they formerly were, 
and their frequent visits to their old home make them well 
known here. They have been not only extensive, but romantic 
travelers. A. T. Bonnifield, a cousin of Dr. Arnold Bonni- 
field, as well as a namesake, lived on Horse Shoe Run until 
he was twenty-one years of age. He married a daughter 
of William Corrick, Esq., of Corrick's Ford, after whom 
the battle of Corrick's Ford is named. In 1859, the Cali- 
fornia excitement took a fresh start in Tucker, and quite a 
number of the young men emigrated to the new State. 
Bonnifield was among the number. With his wife and three 
children, accompanied by John Minear, they sailed from 
New York for Panama. After buying his tickets for San 
Francisco, Bonnifield had just forty dollars left. This was 
a small sum with which to go into a strange country ; but 
it would have to do ; and, when all were on board, the 
steamer passed from the harbor out into the Atlantic. 



TKAVELEKS. 213 

The ship was soon out of sight of land, and then came on 
the dreaded sea-sickness, which none can understand with- 
out experiencing. The fir^t night was probably the most 
terrible to the emigrants who had never been to sea before. 
They lay about the decks as helpless as dead people ; and 
no doubt some would nearly as lief have been dead. The 
officers and crew of the ship took little more notice of the 
passengers who lay retching, than to roll them in heaps 'to 
get them more out of the way. A person when enduring 
sea-sickness will not and cannot hold up his head, and can- 
not help himself. For this reason the crew of the ship were 
much bothered to drag the helpless passengers out of the . 
way. 

Bonnifield was among the sickest. He lay upon the deck 
in great agony all night. Men with lanterns came to him, 
and dragged him to the end of the ship and piled him up 
with the rest of the sea-sick. There he lay till morning. 
"When it was day, he roused up, and thought he could eat 
some fruit. He felt for his money. It was gone. He had 
been robbed, probably by the men who had come to him 
with the lanterns. 

The situation in which he found himself roused him from 
his sickness, and he told his wife that he had been robbed 
of every cent. He was, indeed, in a hard fix. He had not 
enough money to buy a dinner when he should land in San 
Francisco, and a wife and three children were on his hands. 
It was an unpleasant situation to be placed in ; but, he did 
what he could to recover his money. He saw a sneaking 
looking fellow on the ship, and he was struck by the 
thought that the fellow had his money. So he ran 
to the Captain and had him search the scoundrel, who 
protested that he never robbed anybody. But the 



214 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

Captain searclied liim. Nothing was found to prove 
that he had stolen the money, and he was turned loose. 
Bonnifield wanted all the people on the ship searched ; but 
the Captain would not do it, and thus that part of the mat- 
ter ended. 

Bonnifield never got his money. HoAvever, he found 
means of making some money. He had taken on board a 
barrel of apples at New York, and he now exposed them for 
sale at ten cents each. The people, who were beginning to 
recover from their sea-sickness, bought the apples as fast 
as they could get them. They brought in a quantity of 
change. About this time a stand of bees on the ship got 
destroyed ; and Bonnifield bought the honey, and peddled 
it over the ship for twenty-five cents a mouthful. It sold 
fast, and he quickly disposed of his stock and realized a 
handsome profit. 

When he reached San Francisco he had barely enough 
money to pay his way a few niijes into the country. He 
went to work, and gradually accumulated money enough to 
buy a farm. But, the farm's title not being good, he lost 
his money. However, he went to work at the bottom 
again, and in the course of a few years was again com- 
fortably situated. Thus he lived for seven years. His wife 
having died, he took charge of his children and kept them 
together for several years. 

In 1867 he determined to re-visit West Virginia. Ho em- 
barked at San Francisco for New York. Instead of cross- 
ing the Isthmus of Panama, he crossed through Nicaragua, 
in Central America, and took a steadier on the eastern side 
for New Y^'ork. . 

When the ship drew near the shore on the West side of 
Nicaragua, a cannon Avas fired as a signal of approach. 



TKAVELERS. 215 

Tliis v»'as to give tlie natives notice in time for tliem to 
bring their ponies to the landing. It was twelve miles 
across the isthmus, and the passengers and freight had to 
be carried by land. The ship-company paid all these ex- 
penses. There was no railroad, as there Avas at Panama ; 
but there was a Q;ood wacron-road. The women and chil- 
dren were carried across in ambulances tliat Avere formerly 
used in the United States during the war, but had been 
bought by the ship-company and taken to Nicaragua, to be 
used as stages. "^Che men might also ride in these coaches 
if they liked ; but they were given their choice of two 
modes of crossing. They might ride in the ambulances or 
on the ponies of the natives, which were hired for the pur- 
pose. The majority of them chose to ride on the ponies. 
The natives were Indians, and kept the ponies on their 
ranches near about the harbor. They were glad to make a 
few cents by hiring their ponies to the ship-company for 
the use of the passengers. They knew about what day the 
ship would be there, and kept their animals near at hand. 
Each one was anxious to get his pony used in crossing, for 
if he did not, he got no pay. 

So, when the ship was approaching the shore, the cannon 
was fired to call the Indians down to the beach. In a few 
minutes they were seen coming over the hills from the north, 
south and east. They were coming in a sweeping gallop, 
every one trying to be first at the landing, to be sure of 
getting his donkey a rider. 

When the ship landed at the dock, the Indians were 
massed around it like a besieging army. Each one was en- 
deavoring to impress upon some passenger the necessity of 
hiring that particular pony, and the jargon, pow-wow and 
chattering was entirely characteristic of the assembly. 



216 HISTOllY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

The donkeys were white, and looked not much larger 
than slieep. The passengers thought it impossible that an 
animal so small could bear the weight of a man, and so 
were not much inclined to accept one in preference to the 
ambulance-carts. But, the officers of the ship assured the 
passengers that the ponies would carry them all right, and 
then the bargaining began. As said, the ship-company paid 
for tlie animals ; so, the passengers' oul}' care was to select 
as good a one as they could. Every native insisted that his 
was the best; and thus the trading ran high. 

Meanwhile, Bonnifield was busy getting his family started 
off in the ambulances ; so, when he turned about to engage 
a pony, he found that all the best of them were taken, and 
that none but poor or fractious ones were left. He had to 
take one of these, or none. .He took one. It was small, 
lean, bony and looked like the refuse of all that is vile and 
wretched in Central America. The rest of the men were 
already mounted on the more prepossessing of the donkeys, 
and were ready to move off as soon as the word of com- 
mand should be given. Bonnifield took in the situation at 
a glance and saw that he was in danger of being left ; for he 
was certain that his bony beast would never keep up with 
the others. But, he had no time to hunt another, and all 
that was left for him to do was to make tlie best use of his 
means. 

So, picking up a lieav}^ club, he mounted the pon}', ready 
to start with the others, whether he could keej? up or not. 
"What are you going to do M'ith that club?" yelled the In- 
dian who owned the animal, running up and flourishing his 
fist as though about to strike. "I'm going to knock a whole 
side of ribs out of this brute if he don't keep up with the 
rest. That's what I'm going to do. Do you understand 



TKAVELEES. 217 

tliat ?" Bounifield gave the Indian this answer, and told 
him to stand in the background or he would get a little to 
start with. 

The Indian took the hint and retired ; and Bonnifield 
held to his club, for he was determined not to be left in 
that wild country, and was not in a very good humor any 
way. His donkey was so small that the rider's feet almost 
dragged the ground. 

The word to start was given just as the sun was going 
down. Immediately the whole cavalcade was one of com- 
motion and excitement. The two or three hundred ponies 
that the passengers feared would not be able to carry tliem 
across, were now plunging up the road at a sweeping gallop, 
every one trying to lead the way. The smallest and most 
bony seemed more fiery and impetuous than those which 
had been first chosen. The weakest was fully strong enough 
to carry a man as fast as he cared to go. 

Bounifield was soon convinced that he had no need of a 
club. His donkey was so impetuous that he had to drop 
his cudgel and sieze the bridle with both hands. 

The road led through hills and vales, covered with the 
luxurient vegetation of the Torrid Zone. Cocoanut trees 
stood thick along the way ; and bamboos and reeds formed 
a dense copse. It was a splendid ride that evening. The 
sun went down before they had gone a mile ; but this only 
increased the beauty of the evening. It got cooler, and the 
cavalcade thundered on up the road. At times they halted 
by the wayside to buy sugar, fruit and nuts of the natives, 
who had built little stores every mile or two. Several of 
the store-keepers were negroes who had com^ from the 
United States, and had settled in that unhospitable country 
for the purpose of trading with travelers. 



218 HISTOEY OF TUCKEK COUNTY 

Bonuifield rode forward witli the others till awhile after 
dark. The fruit and sugar that he had eaten caused such 
thirst that he tried at each store to get a drink; but no water 
was at hand, and the shop-keepers were too busy to fetch 
any, so he rode on. Presently the road turned down a ra- 
vine, and far below in the wilderness and darkness the rip- 
pling of water could be heard. He said that he must have 
a drink, live or die. He was told that the woods were full 
of beasts and venomous snakes, and he would run great risk 
in going down in the dark. But he would not be pursuaded. 

Giving the rein of his pony to a companion to hold, he 
scrambled down the hill. He could hear the Avater bubbling 
and was guided by the noise. It was too dark to see any- 
thing. The weeds and thorns were so thick that he had to 
part them with his hands, and scramble over the tops, and 
pitch and fall, and slip "and slide ; but at last he reached the 
water and lay down and drank. The water was cool, and 
when his thirst was allayed, he rose up with satisfaction 
and was preparing to start iip the hill. But just then a lion 
sprang out the thicket and roared. Bonnifield's hair stood 
on end with fright, and he leaped sheer ten feet over the 
tops of briers, brush and rocks, up against the bluff, and 
thence on to the road above, where he mounted his donkey, 
and bid an adieu forever to the wild beasts of Ccnti'al 
America. 

In an hour longer the travelers reached the Kio San Juan 
del Sur, where boats awaited to carr}' them down to the sea 
coast. The passage down the river was one of romance 
and magnificence, and is described as one of the finest in 
the world. The banks of the stream w^ere covered with 
groves of tropical trees, and flowers always in bloom. 
There is no winter there. Birds with feathers bright as 



i 



TEANELEES. 219 

gold and silver fly among the trees, and monkeys cliatter 
amid the thickets of bamboos. Basking in the sun along 
the water's edge, huge alligators could be seen stretching 
their ugly carcasses. It was along this river several years 
before that Capt. E. Harper had so many adventures shoot- 
ing alligators and chasing wild beasts and fighting the wild 
Indians. 

When the sun was risen on the morrow, the passengers 
were embarked on boats, and moved gayly off down the 
river and across the bay. There was a considerable convoy, 
and it must have looked like an army to the Indians who 
stood on the shores and gazed wonderingly at the grand 
procession of boats as it moved peacefully over the shining 
water. "Get in the boat, you land-lubber!" yelled one of 
the sailors to Bonnifield who was washing his feet by let- 
ting them drag along through the water, over the gunwale. 
" Get in the boat, or the alligators will pepper your hash." 
Thus warned, he hauled his feet aboard ; and looking into 
the water, he could see hideous monsters swimming along 
under the boat, waiting for somebody to fall overboard. . 

When the deep water was reached, the passengers went 
aboard a steamship and stood off for New York. The pas- 
sage was rough ; but all safely landed there, and Bonnifield 
soon reached Tucker. He remained there over a year, vis- 
iting in the mean time Michigan, Indiana, Ohio and Illinois, 
while his children attended school. He owned the horse 
on which Abe Bonnifield has since ridden tens of thousands 
of miles. 

In 1868, he returned to California, having married in 
Tucker a daughter of Job Parsons, Esq. In 1881 he again 
visited the East, and spent the summer in West Virginia 
and Kentucky. He now resides in California. 



CHAPTER XIV. 

TEA YELER8— CONTINUED. 

Capt. Ezekiel Haepee was bom November 28, 1823. 
His father was Adam Harper whose sketch has been given 
in a former chapter. Energy and adventure is a character- 
istic of the family ; and of none more than of the subject of 
the present sketch. His early life was spent on the home 
farm, and the stir and commotion of the wide world was all 
a blank to him. The narrow, but beautiful valley of Clover 
was the field of his youthful adventures, and it was there 
that he grew to manhood, every inch of him a man. His 
constitution was of iron, and his will succumbed only to 
the impossible. 

From his earliest years he was an attentive and extensive 
reader; and he kept himself posted on all political ques- 
tions, and on all the issues that the press brought before 
the people. When he became a man, the Valley of Clover 
became too narrow for him, and he began to think of new 
fields. Thus it was when the Mexican War came on. He 
Lad always had a desire to see the southern and western 
countries ; and this seemed the best opportunity that had 
been presented. 

There was no movement made in Tucker to organize a 
company ; but, in Barbour, Col. Henry Sterms mustered a 
company and held them ready for service. Harper joined 
the company ; and as far as can now be ascertained, he was 
the only man from Tucker who did. 

He waited anxiously for the call for his company to take 



TRAVELERS. 221 

the field. The newspapers were filled with accounts from 
the seat of war. He read of the fight at Matamoras, at 
Monterey ; of the rout of Santa Anna from the gorges of 
Buena Vista, of the fall of Ringgold at Palo Alto. The 
battles of Resaca de la Palma, Saltillo, Cerro Gorgo and 
Contreas passed off, and still no orders came for the com- 
pany to take the field. The President had called for fifty 
thousand volunteers, and the call had been responded to by 
over three hundred thousand. So, there were many men 
who, like Harper, were waiting with more or less impatience 
for a call to arms. The war, although yet waged to the 
extremest limit of vengeance and national hatred, was plainly 
drawing to a close. Mexico was going down ; and defeat 
on defeat and rout on rout hurried her doom. The rear of 
the cannon had died on the field of Churusbusco ; and, the 
greatest and last, the storming of Chapultepec ended 
the war. 

Harper was uncalled. It was a disappointment ; but it 
came on him gradually, and he continued working on the 
farm, and dealing in cattle. 

But a new and more romantic field of adventure was 
opening for him. Scarcely had the Mexican War closed, 
when the discovery of gold, at Sutter's Mills, in California, 
fiUed the country with excitement. Those who can remem- 
ber, know how the land was filled with wild stories of gold 
in exhaustless stores, and how the rumors ran from ocean 
to ocean, and adventurers risked everything in their efforts 
to be first and foremost on the ground. Those who cannot 
remember, probably will never know. It was an epoch in 
the world's history, in the history of America, and in the 
annals of Tucker County. Ifc did not work such lasting 
changes as the Crusades or the French Revolution ; but its 



222 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

clianges and results have left a stamp on the chronicles of 
America that will endure for ages to come. There has 
never been in the world anything else like it. 

In the great rush for the gold diggings, people came from 
every part of the world. Tucker, although a small territory, 
then not so much as a distinct county, sent not a few. 
Perhaps no county in America, of not a greater population, 
has furnished as many emigrants to California as Tucker 
has. It has sent them from the very first ; and they have 
generally been among the best of our citizens. Our own 
wealth and resources have only recently become known ; 
and, heretofore, people of enterprise could see in our nar- 
row valleys and rugged hills little to invite exertion or to 
promise return for capital invested. From this cause, the 
most ambitious and energetic of our people, in former days, 
looked to farther and wider fields in which to contend in 
fortune's arena. Our timber was then next to valueless, 
and our vast coal regions were then not supposed to be 
worth the taxes. 

It was on account of this that so many men of ambition 
and ability Aveut west and south and north, or just any 
place where there was encouragement to put forth exertion. 
The tide has now turned, and is setting toward instead of 
from us. Instead of the poorest, we have one of the rich- 
est counties in the State. But this was not known when the 
rumors from California were alluring away so many of our 
young men. 

Gold was discovered in California in 1848. The news 
soon spread from state to state, and it reached West Vir- 
ginia and Tucker County the same year. None hailed the 
news more gladly- tlian Mr. Harper, who still remembered 
his disa})pointment in not getting to go to the Mexican 



TEAYELEKS. 223 

"War, and was waiting for an opportunity to try something 
else of tlie same nature. Not a day was lost. He and A. 
P. Minear, of St. George, were the first to go. But Harper 
was the first. Minear went by water in 1849. Harper 
started in 1848, and wintered in Iowa. So anxious was he 
to get to the mines that he braved every danger in crossing 
the plains. Iowa was then on the frontier. Between there 
and California was a wide, desert plain, and the almost im- 
passable Eocky and Sierra Nevada mountains. Then it 
was an unknown country. A few explorers and adventurers 
had crossed, and a few small military posts, scattered at 
immense distances apart, served as the only evidence of 
civilized man. Large bands of wild and warlike Indians 
infested the region beyond the Missouri Eiver, and were 
ever ready to fall upon any who should come into their 
country. 

Early in the spring of 1849, Harper joined a train of ad- 
venturers and passed up the Platte Eiver, and crossed the 
Eocky Mountains. A full journal of the compan}", with all 
that happened from day to da}', would fill too much space 
here. Nothing of special importance took place. The 
routine of camp life, and traveling incidents Avere the same 
or similar from da}' to day. They drove ox teams, hitched 
to ponderous wagons. There were no graded roads. On 
the plains they needed none ; but, in the mountains it was 
often next to impossible to proceed. Sometimes they would 
let their wagons down mountains by ropes and pulleys. Or, 
they would fell trees, tie them by the tops to the hind axle 
of the wagons, and the stiff limbs, thus plowing in the 
ground, allowed the wagons to descend slowly. 

Along the Humboldt it was a wild, desert country. The 
hills had no water, trees, grass or shrubs. The valleys be- 



224= HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

tween the hills were barren and lifeless, and were often 
covered with salt and alkali. 

When the emigrants reached this region, their progress 
became slower than before. They could find little forage 
for their cattle, and at times water was not to be had. The 
Indians, too, were ever hovering over the way, and none 
could feel safe, unless traveling in large companies. This 
served to keep the trains together, and, of course, made it 
harder to find things for the cattle to eat. It was probably 
the most distressing portion of all the journey ; and it was 
there, amid the rocky hills and alkaline plains, that many 
an adventurous man has found the termination of his 
wanderings. 

These delays and perplexities were not endureable to a 
man of Harper's ambition and determination. He was too 
anxious to be first upon the Calif ornian gold fields to be 
bothering with lazy ox teams and trundling carts, when the 
bourne of his dreams was only three or four hundred miles 
away, was not his nature. He had staid back, and endured 
the slow traveling until he reached the Sinks of the Hum- 
boldt River, that mysterious laud where a river sinks in 
the sand, and all trace of it is lost. Here he expressed his 
determination to proceed in advance of the emigrants. 
They tried to persuade him from it, and pointed out the 
great dangers that would beset him if traveling alone through 
that wild and uncivilized countr}-. But, like M'Cleland, he 
said that he could take care of himself. He shouldered his 
rifle and knapsack and struck forward alone into the rugged 
hills and snowy mountains. The huge crest of the Sierras 
lay before him, towering white and ponderous toward the 
sky, and presenting a wall against the world beyond. It 
was a fatal region, and few men could have crossed it alone. 



TRAVELERS. 225 

The Indians had made paths through tlie ravines and 
gorges, and bears and panthers had tramped a trail over the 
ridges. These, the stars and sun, and a slight knowledge of 
the geography of the rivers, were his only guides. At day 
he plodded slowly along among rocks and bowlders, or over 
wide plains, covered with a crust of salt, or alkaline dust, 
and across desert prairies, where even the wild Indians sel- 
dom would venture. At night he would creep into a hole 
in the rocks and sleep. Sometimes wolves would hoAvl at 
him, and bears would stop to look at him ; but from mercy 
or fear, they did not molest him. 

The way up the Sierra Navadas was, like the Alps were 
to Napoleon, "barely possible." He wound his way from 
ridge to ridge and from summit to summit. Sometimes the 
drifts of snow blockaded his path, or a deep ravine forced 
him to go miles out of his way. But still he went forward, 
and at last, after days of climbing and wandering among the 
rocks and snows of centuries, he reached the last summit, 
and California lay before him. Behind him, for hundreds 
and hundreds of miles, stretched the dead plains of Nevada 
and Utah, over which he had passed. It seemed that his 
journey was almost over. He was on the borders of Cali- 
fornia, the Land of Promise to him. As he stood there, in 
the bright sun and keen air of that afternoon, amid ever- 
lasting snows, he looked afar down upon the rolling hills 
and boundless plains that lay like an ocean before him, and 
thought of the throngs that were then drifting thither from 
all parts of the earth to share in the rich harvest of golden 
sands. He was one of the most adventuresome of all. He 
was a 3'oung man, buoj'ant with all the hopes and ambitions 
of youth, and the ransacked world had no impossibilities 
for him. He would yield to none in the general race for 

15 



22G HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

•v\'ealtli and romance. He counted himself, as lie stood 
alone on tlie bleak summit of that icy mountain, even then 
a conqueror. And he was; for many a hero would have 
failed where he had triumphed. 

But the end of his journey was not yet. Down, down, 
down, over mountains, compared with which the Allegha- 
nies are molehills, he must go before he would reach the 
mines of gold. 

He traveled nine days alone, and tde only coffee and 
crackers. At the end of that time he reached Placerville, 
then a small mining camp called Hangtown. He came to 
the camp late in the evening, without money or anything 
to eat. He went without his supper because he had noth- 
ing with which to buy it, and slept on the ground for the 
want of a bed. The mines were just then opening, and 
there were not many miners in the country. He knew not 
where to get his breakfast the next morning, and with that 
problem perplexing him, he walked up and down the camp, 
and came to a small creek where some Spaniards were dig- 
ging gold. He stopped to look at them. The gold was in 
£no grains, mixed through the sand and gravel, and was 
separated by washing and shaking it. It was a simple 
process, and Avheu Harper had watched it awhile, he con- 
cluded that he could do it. 

He went to the camp of a trader and borrowed a pick 
and pan, and set to work digging gold to get money to buy 
his breakfast. Ho succeeded so well that by nine o'clock 
he thought he had enough to pay for some crackers, and 
carried it to the trader who paid him six dollars for it, and 
offered him his breakfast free. But the latter part of the 
offer was declined by Harper who paid for the meal from 
the proceeds of his morning's work. 



TKAVELERS. 227 

He remained at Placeville only long onougli to earn a 
few hundred dollars, and then he proceeded to Colonra, on 
the South Fork of American Eiver. Here he was offered 
five thousand dollars to work on a saw-mill one year ; but 
he declined the offer, saying that he came to California to 
dig gold, not to chop logs. 

We next find him at Rectors, on the Middle Fork of 
American River. He and five others put in the first flume 
ever built on that river for mining purposes. They took a 
river claim that promised to yield abundantly, and made 
extensive preparations to open their mines. But winter 
was now at hand, and the annual rains commenced. They 
worked some in the rain, and waited for it to cease ; but it 
rained nearly constantly. The waters got so high that all 
mining had to stop. He was now out of employment, and 
began to wish that he had taken the contract on the mill. 

But he would not be discouraged. He bought a rifle and 
hunted deer to supply the miners with meat. This paid 
very well, since venison brought an enormous price in the 
diggings. This was the upper camp on that river ; and 
during the winter the Indians were troublesome. They 
killed several men, and broke up some of the camps. The 
miners organized for their defense, and a general frontier 
war was the result. 

Now commenced Captain Harper's record as a war scout. 
He soon became known to be a skillful woodsman, and a 
daring leader, and the camps placed him in command of 
their fighting force. His band was small ; but the men 
were picked from the chivalry of thirty states, and they 
knew what it was to be brave. He had the confidence of 
his men and he was not afraid to trust them. The Indians 
came down from the mountains and killed peojile, and fled 



228 HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

back to their strong liolds. It was difficult and dangerous 
to pursue them and hunt them out, and they went unpun- 
ished for sometime. But when Harper took command of 
the forces, the tables were soon turned. The Indians had 
attacked three miners, and killed one. Two were wounded 
and carried off as prisoners into the mountains. 

Harper collected his men as soon as he heard the rumor 
of what had been done, and by daylight he was in hot pur- 
suit. The savages were making for the mountains to their 
dens, where they had been accustomed to hide. They, no 
doubt, expected to get away as they had done before ; but 
they had a different man to deal with. Harper pressed 
forward with all speed, and forced them upon a flying re- 
treat over the long, barren ridges that skirt the plains of 
the American River. They found that he did not turn back 
for rocks and cliffs. They then shaped their course for the 
stupendous mountains in the distance, where the snow lay 
deep on the ground. They evidently calculated that he 
would stop at the edge of the snow. But he had seen snow 
before, and it was nothing more in his way than it was in 
theirs. Rather, it was a help, for it enabled him to follow 
them without spending time in searching out the trail. 

They now realized what kind of man they had to deal 
with, and they were at their wit's ends how to dodge him 
or to draw him into an ambuscade. There was nothing 
left for them but to run for their lives, and they had little 
time to decide upon it. It was now late at night. The 
pursuit had continued all day, with only rest long enough 
to eat twice. The Indians, as near as could bo ascertained, 
had not eaten or rested at all. The snow was two feet 
deep, but in nearlj' all places it would bear the weight of a 
man. There was no difficulty in following the savages, and 



TEAVELEES. 229 

it could be noticed that sometliing was being gained. The 
fact was, they were the hardest put to it to keep away any 
longer. They were never before pursued by a man who 
hung on with such bull-dog determination. Others were 
accustomed to follow to the rocks, or probably to the snow, 
but there they turned back. But there was no turn back 
in the present case, and the Indians found it so to their 
sorrow ; for late at night they left their prisoners, and sep- 
arated in as many ways as there were Indians, which, of 
course, ended the pursuit. 

The two wounded men were picked up, more dead than 
alive. The party returned to camp, which they reached the 
next evening. 

By this time Harper was considered the leading scout in 
all that country; and he was kept constantly on duty. He 
roamed among the hills and was sure to discover the trail of 
any Indians who should go toward the mining camps. 
They hated him, and would have killed him on sight, if 
they had not been afraid to undertake it. He was a splen- 
did shot with a rifle, and it was risky work for the Indian 
who would venture within two hundred yards of him. They 
sometimes tried to slip in at night ; but he would always 
prevent it. 

It had been a rainy week on the American Eiver, late in 
the winter of 1849, and the miners had remained for the 
most part in their tents, amusing themselves with cards or 
other games. But the rain brought no rest for Harper. 
He was kept on scout duty all the time. He soon had 
searched the country for miles around ; and, in a deep val- 
ley, some seven miles from the mining camps, he found the 
den of the Indians. He reconnoitred and found them a 
arge band. Toward sunset he started to camp to report, 



230 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

and as lie proceeded, he fell upon a trail running in the 
direction of his camps. The thought struck him that the 
Indians meant mischief, and he determined to follow them 
and hunt out their designs. He had not far to go till he 
espied them huddling around their fire. He took another 
path, and reached the mining ciimp about nine o'clock at 
night. 

He found everything in uproar and confusion among the 
miners. News had been received that the Indians had fallen 
upon a camp of traders, near by but on the opposite side 
of the river. The river was too much swollen for safe cross- 
ing, and the traders on one side and the miners on the 
other were accustomed to talk each day across the stream. 
On that day, when the miners went down to the river to talk 
across, they saw no traders, but instead they saw a band of 
Indians tearing down the traders' tents, and breaking 
open their goods. When the news was carried to camp, it 
threw all into excitement, and some were in favor of re- 
treating toward Sacramento and others wanted to fortify 
the camp and fight it through. 

In the midst of this commotion Harper arrived, and re- 
ported that he had seen a camp of the enemy not far oflf. 
He was in for an immediate attack, but some opposed him. 
Biit he collected his thirty men, and armed them for a 
double-quick march upon the camp of the enemy. 

At midnight he started with his thirt}^ men, and picked 
his wa}'- through the tangled thickets of snow-brush and 
manzanita that covered the hillsides. It w^as a dark night, 
and the progress was slow and tedious. The Indian camp 
was four miles distant, and so rough was the way that it was 
not reached till daj'-break. Harper had planned to sur- 
round it so that none of the savage wretches could break 



TRAVELERS. , 231 

away. He sent liis men by several paths to come up on 
different sides of tlie encampment ; and lie went up directly 
in front with four men. He got near enough to count five 
Indians. He waited for the rest of his party to get into 
position ; but when he had grown somewhat impatient with 
waiting, he saw his party on a distant hill. '^Ohey had taken 
the wrong path and had lost their way. He determined to 
make the attack anyhow. He whispered to his men to fire 
wdien he should have raised his gun. They did so. The 
almost instantaneous report of five guns proclaimed that 
five Indians were in eternity. None were left in the camp. 
All were killed. In the camp was found some of the plun- 
der taken from the traders. Harper's band then crossed 
the river, and attacked the other gang of savages, and 
utterly' routed them, not even allowing them time to carry 
off their plunder.^ 

These skirmishes acted as a damper upon the Indians. 
They found themselves unable to cope with the men of the 
mines. Harper soon beset them in their camp seven miles 
away, in the hidden valley, and they were beaten out, and 
chased pell-mell up and down the hills, and were given no 
place to rest. They were kept upon the trot day and night, 
and finally they broke up into small bands and fled to the 
mountains of the North, far beyond the limits of the mines. 
This ended the Indiar war of 1849, in that section. 

In the spring of 1850, E. Harper's two brothers, Thad- 
deus and Jerome, arrived in California, and the three worked 
in the mines that year. They then went to Santa Clara 
Valley and bought a farm. Thaddeiis and Jerome re- 
mained on the farm ; but Ezekiel returned to the mines and 
worked till Decembfir, 1851. He then sailed from San 
Francisco for New York. He stopped in Central America, 



232 HISTOIIY OF TUCKER COUNTY 

and sjient sometime Inmting, and shooting alligators, liz- 

zards and large snakes along tlie banks of El Rio San Juan 

Del Sur. He arrived in New York, and soon after reached 

home. He visited his parents, and early in the spring of 

1852 again set out to cross the plains for California. This 

time his brother Jacob accompanied him and they reached 

Missouri without the" occurrence of anything of note. There 

they bought four thousand sheep, intending to drive them 

to California. If an ox team was slow, a band of sheep was 

slower. The progress was not encouraging. Five or six, 

or at most ten miles a day M-as as much as could be made. 

The Indians M-ere not particularly troublesome at that time, 

and by the commencement of summer the sheep had been 

driven to the summit of the Rockj^ Mountains. 

At that time the Asiatic cholera Avas raging on the plains, 

and Jacob Harper did not escape. "What little liis brother 

could do for him amounted to nothing, and he died on the 

summit of the Rocky Mountains, and was buried by his 

brother. His untimely death cast a shadow of gloom over 

all, and it was Avith feelings of sadness that his companions 

moved on, down the Avild Avestern slope, and left him to the 

society of storms and tempests. 

The Indian knows his place of rest 
Deep in tlie forest shade. 

The sheeji Avere driven on to California, and were sold 
with great profit. With the proceeds of these sales, to- 
gether Avith those of the teams and wagons, and also of the 
farm in Santa Clara Valley, they built a block in San Fran- 
cisco. It Avas called the St. Charles. His brother remained 
in San Francisco, but E. Haj)er went to Oregon, built a store 
at Raineer, and shipped produce to the other members of 
the firm in the city. 



TKAVELEES. 233 

In the spring of 1855, their property in San Francisco 
was burnt. Their loss was great, and they had nothing 
left when they had paid their liabilities. Captain Harper 
returned to the mines and worked as hard as he had done 
in early mining days. At the end of five months he had 
saved $2500. The next winter, 1855-6, he sailed on the 
Golden Age for Panama, and thence to New York. He 
yisited his parents in the Yalley of Clover, and traveled 
over nearl}' all the Western States. 

In December, 1856, he sailed from New York on the steamer 
Geo7'ge Law. This was to him a memorable voyage, and 
the ship has since become memorable. It was the famous 
Central America that sunk the next year in the Caribbean 
Sea. This voyage of Harper's, in December, 1857, came 
near being the final one. When off Cape Hatteras there 
came on a terrible storm. That Cape protrudes into the 
stormiest part of the Atlantic, and a ship seldom passes it 
without being beset with hurricanes and waves. Many a 
stout ship has succumbed and gone down there. 

As the George Law was passing that point, it was struck 
by a gale. The ship was old, and the storm was a dreadful 
one. The ship was thrown on its beam end, and lay twen- 
ty-four hours at the mercy of the billows. An exrtact from 
one of Harper's letters written after his arrival in Aspinwall 
will give a vivid account of the storm. 

ASPiNWALii, January 18, 1857. 

It came without -warning, I was standing on the 

hurricane deck, when I noticed that the clouds were flying with 
uncommon speed and in different directions. They seemed to boil 
up out of the ocean and roll hither and thither, up and down the sky, 
until they hid everything from view, except the water, which at 
that time was calm as it ever is in that part of the sea. The clouds 
appeared to be nearly on the water; and they came nearer and 



234 HISTOKY OF TUCKEE COUNTY. 

grew blacker, till, suddenly, I found that darkness was settling 
down upon us, and all nature, »o much of it as was visible, was 
changing appearance, and was assuming an ominous aspect. 

So intently Avas I watching the transformations going on in the 
firmaments about me, that I had not noticed what others were do- 
ing. In all my travels I had never beheld such a sight, and I stood 
in amazement and wonder, at an utter loss to divine what it meant 
or what it portended. But, at this point, I was aroused from my 
reverie by a sailor w^ho seized me by the arm and ordered me to go 
below. I now saw that everything on the ship was in commotion. 
The captain was standing by the generale giving orders, and the 
sailors were taking in sail and clearing the decks, and getting 
everything in readiness for the worst. The passengers were neai'ly 
all in the cabin or the hold ; but I could see that they were in the 
greatest consternation. I stood where I was, till the order to get 
below was repeated with a threat. I then started. 

Just then I felt the first breath of the coming storm. A whiff ©f 
wind struck my face, then another, and another, each one getting 
stronger and quicker, till they became a strong breeze. There was 
something in that breeze that seemed to prophesy what was coming. 
Perhaps the subsequent storm, or probably the appearance of the 
elements, or the commotion on the ship, left the impression ; but I 
got it there, and when that breeze struck me, I felt that a calamity 
was at hand. 

The ship was now rocking and plunging in a dreadful manner. 
The waves were beating over her, and the deluge of water that 
was poured upon the deck nearly washed me from my feet before 
I could get below. Just as I did so, a tremendous wave struck the 
ship. I thought the whole thing was flying to splinters. The tim- 
bers crashed and creaked, and the vessel rolled helplessly upon her 
side as if she had given up the struggle and had surrendered to her 
fate. 

The scene among the panic-stricken passengers at that awful 
moment was beyond the powers of language to describe. Every- 
thing movable rolled to the lower side of the ship, and there piled 
up in confusion and ruin. I seized a post to save myself from fall- 
ing and being buried In the connuon wreck. I seized the i)ost with 



TEAYELERS. 235 

one hand and with the other caught a lady who was falhng. She 
said : "Are we lost ?" I told her, "No," and she seemed to place 
confidence in what I said, although I had no idea of ever seeing 
the sun again. I could hear the water roaring over us ; and the 
groaning of the timbers and the crushing of the braces made it evi- 
dent that it would soon be over ac that rate. I don't belive that I 
was excited or in any degree lost my presence of mind. I reasoned 
as clearly as I do now. Around me, above the dash and roar and 
thunder of the ocean, I could hear the poor terror-stricken passen- 
gers shriek and implore ; but I had no such feelings. I have looked 
upon too many scenes and exhibitions of the terrible in all its forms 
to be frightened at anything. 

I felt surprised that the ship did not go to pieces and sink. I 
hung to the post, intending to do so to the last. There was no 
change in the situation for some time, till the ship sprung a leak. 

■tc s|> i)c iX « 4 H< 

I held to the post no longer. I let the lady take care of herself. 
I saw that there was something to be done. I got on deck, and 
held to the rigging. The spray flew so as to nearly blind me, and 
also, at times, strangled me. There were only five among the pas- 
sengers who were able to do anything. I was one of the five. We 
held to the rigging with one hand and pumped water with the 
other. Before night the water was six feet deep in the ship, and 
all the pumps were working to their utmost capacity. That 
was a terrible night. There was no abatement in the storm. The 
ship rolled at the mercy of the 

Wild waves and the remorseless dasli of billows. 
The night was intensely dark, and the clouds seemed to have come 
down upon the fierce, black ocean, and enshrouded all in a gloom 
as thick as the darkness that fell as a plague upon Egypt. It was 
a long night. I think it was the longest I ever knew. 

I took no rest. We five worked unceasingly at the pumps. All 
the rest of the passengers were helpless with fatigue and sea sick- 
ness, so that, in addition to our work at the pumps, we had to pro- 
vide for those who were unable to do anything for themselves. 
*«■»**** 

There is such a thing as utter exhaustion. Before morning came, 
we were unable to do anything scarcely ; for, the work, and hun- 



236 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

ger, had pulled us down. Still we kept at the pumps and did the 
best we could. We, at last, began to hope that there was some 
chance of escape. This may have aided us to struggle on ; but, at 
best, it was little we could do. When morning broke, it found our 
ship in a deplorable plight. But the storm soon began to abate, 
and at length we considered ourselves out of immediate danger. 
AVhen all became calm enough to permit the captain to take the 
latitude and longitude he found the ship only twenty-four miles 
from where it had been at the commencement of the storm. This 
seems proof to my mind that the wind blew from various directions. 
The water was six feet deep in the ship when we got into this har- 
bor. It has been a miraculous escape. 

This ship, the George Lan\ has an after history worth 
mentioning. It was taken back to New York and repaired 
and named the Central America. Its fate is known the world 
over. It sailed from Aspinwall with a full load of passen- 
gers. It went down in the Caribbean Sea, with nearly all 
on board. Poets and orators have told the story, and it is 
a sad one. There were about twenty of Harper's acquaint- 
ances on board. The passengers were on their way from 
California, and many of them carried in their belts the 
earnings of years. When it was found that the ship must 
go down, the men began to unload themselves of the gold, 
which they empted from their belts upon the deck, until, 
according to an eye witnesss, there was no spot fi'om one 
end of the ship to the other, whereon a man might set his 
foot, that was not covered with gold. But it did no good, 
and the ship went down with its gold and its human beings 
and the ruthless Caribbean waves rolled over all. 

Harper returned to California and with his brothers mined 
and dealt in cattle. The business prospered well. So well, 
indeed, that they conceived the plan of establishing a house 
in Chili, South America. The few Europeans and Americana 
who had gone there were making fortunes. Jerome Harper 



TEAVELERS. 237 

was sent there. It was about this time that the insurrec- 
tion broke out in Chili. The people there were oppressed 
with all tyranny, and politics were in a deplorable condi- 
tion. Tlie measure was full of risk and danger, but Jerome 
had established a merchants' commission store there. He 
was doing a large business when the rebellion came on. 
With the characteristics of his family, he at once took sides 
in the controversy, and in so doing, he gave his sympathy 
and assistance to the rebels. The war raged dreadfully for 
awhile ; but the Government forces were the most powerful 
and the rebellion was crushed. The rebels, as fast as they 
could find transportation, were banished to Patagonia. That 
country then was, and still is, among the least civilized 
regions on the globe. It was the Siberia of South America; 
and those who were exiled to the savage hills, where it 
rains or snows three hundred days in the year, met a fate 
as dreadful as the Nihilists who now languish in the icy 
prisons of Asiatic Russia. 

E. Harper could get no tidings from his brother, further 
than that he sympathized with the rebels. When the news 
reached California that the rebels were conquered and were 
being banished to Patagonia, Captain Harper concluded 
that his brother must have been sent to Patagonia. Time, 
with no tidings from Jerome, convinced him more strongly of 
this ; and, with an ever commendable generosity, he deter- 
mined to go to the rescue of his brother. 

Captain Harper was intimately acquainted with the U. S. 
Minister to Chili, and through his interposition hoped to 
procure the release of his brother. The property in San 
Francisco and in the country was sold to raise funds for 
that purpose. He came down to Pataluma, near San 
Francisco, and was intending to make the sale of some 



238 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

property there, and tlien proceed in person to Chili to do 
"what he could for Jerome. But when just on the eve of 
departure, he got intelligence that Jerome had arrived in 
San Francisco, and was out of money. Harper sent him 
twenty dollars on M^iich to come to Pataluraa, and without 
awaiting his arrival, returned north and canceled the sales 
he had made. Those made in San Francisco and Pataluma 
were also canceled, so that there was no great loss after all. 

After this, Mr. Harper worked some mines and dealt in 
cattle till 1860. At that time his parents wrote to him to 
come home as they needed his care. He closed his busi- 
ness and returned to his native county. 

This was in 1860, and the Civil War was at hand. Har- 
per was a man who always took sides one way or the other. 
If he was not a friend he Avas an eneni}'. So, when 
the war came on, he joined the Confederates, and 
threw his whole energies into his cause. The first active 
service he saw was at the battle of Corrick's Ford, where he 
acted as pilot to Garnett's retreating army, and led it 
safely through mountain paths and narrow defiles across 
the Alleghanies. TJie i")articulars and a full account of this 
will be found elsewhere in this book. It is proposed to 
give here only such of his history as is not connected in a 
general way with other county matters. 

The next we hear of him ho was in Pendleton County, 
activel}- engaged in the field. That ]>art of the State was 
then held by the Confederates. There was fighting to be 
done. The man who had braved the dangers of mountain, 
plain and sea, and had seen duty in the wildest country on 
earth, was sure to be of service in guerrilla warfare among 
the steep cliffs and narrow defiles of Pendleton County. 

It was not long before there was j)lenty of fighting to be 



TEAYELEKS. 239 

clone. The Federals were advancing into the country, and 
Harper was sent out, with a company of otliers, to annoy 
them, but not to offer battle, unless favored b}'' great odds. 
He got in front of several hundred, and saAv a chance to 
strike them a telling blow. He made an impetuous charge, 
and drove them back upon the main body and captured 
two horses. But he had advanced too far, and found him- 
self in danger of being taken prisoner. The Yankees were 
on three sides of him. He had a good horse, and it was 
now a ride for life. He kept his distance and was thinking 
himself almost beyond danger, when a ball cut through his 
coat, and another stuck his horse in the neck and killed 
him instantly. Harper ran on a-foot. One, a tall fellow of 
the enemy, out-stripped the others of the chase and came 
close upon him. It was a sad risk for the young soldier, 
and dearly did he pay for it. He was pressing a man whom 
it was not safe to press in a case of that time. 

Harper got beyond range of the enemy's muskets, and 
then halted to collect his men. He could find only two. 
But with these he made a stand, and having greatly the 
advantage of ground, he held them in check for some time, 
and until both of his brave comrades fell dead at bis side. 
He then continued his retreat and succeeded in making his 
escape. But, the two captured horses were retaken, and 
he got back to the Confederate lines withoTit a horse. This 
exploit gave him a name in that country, and the very next 
day he was elected captain of a company of rangers. 

This was duty that suited him. He was an excellent 
woodsman, and understood well the management of scouting 
parties. He and his brother William were the principal 
leaders of the guerrilla bands in that region; and so 
dashing and rapid were they in their movements, and so 



240 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

quick to understand and tliwart any effort made to circum- 
vent tliem, that tlie Yankees were in mortal dread when- 
ever in that re^ijion. 

It is not the intention to give the details of all the skir- 
mishes that took place in that section. That belongs to 
the history of Pendleton County ; and it should be pre- 
served as local history. 

It was about this time that the McDowell fight took place. 
It was thought proper to keep the Federals in Beverly from 
aiding in the fight, and with this in view, Captain Harper 
was ordered to make a movement as if to attack Beverly, 
and thus keep there what troops were in it. 

He immediately fulfilled his orders. He selected twenty 
of his most trusty men and came down from the mountains 
with a bold front, and advanced within one mile and a half 
of the town. Here he captured a store, and made all the 
display of his forces possible, so as to make an impression 
of fear upon the enemy. In this he was successful, inas- 
much as he did what he attempted ; but he met misfortunes 
before he was done with it. 

The people on Dry Fork were principally Union men, 
and had organized companies of their own, and called them 
Home Guards. Their enemy often called them Swamp 
Dragons. Sampson Snider was one of the most noted 
leaders of the Union guerrillas of Dry Fork. When Har- 
per made his raid from Pendleton toward Beverly, he forgot 
that he was laying himself open to an attack from Snyder, 
who could cross over from Dry Fork and assail him in 
flank. When he had made all the display in front of Bev- 
erly that was deemed prudent, he retreated with his 
twenty chosen men, all in fine spirits and superbly 
mounted, to Shafer's Mountain. 



TRAYELEES. 241 

Heve lie was surprised and routed by Snyder's Company 
from Dry Fork. He lost all his guns, but saved liis men, 
and making a forced march, camped that night above 
Franklin. The next morning he spied out the Federal 
Army and counted the regiments. There were twenty- 
seven. He learned that they were aiming to get in the 
rear of Stonewall Jackson. He at once set out Avitli all 
speed to Staunton to convey the intelligence. When he 
stepped into Mayor Hammer's office, he found him pressing 
teams into service to send to Winchester for the captured 
spoils. Harper told him to stop the teams, that Fremont 
was moving in the rear of Jackson with twenty-seven regi- 
ments. When the Mayor heard this and saw who was 
speaking, he ordered the teams stopped and dispatched to 
Jackson what the situation was. He did not even ask Har- 
per how he knew whereof he spoke. 

Soon after this. Harper joined the regular army; but he 
was seldom required to do camp duty. He was a good 
scout, and services as such were worth more than as a sol- 
dier. When Imboden made his raids into this section of 
the State, he was piloted by either Captain or William 
Harper. Captain Harper led the party that crossed the 
mountains with such remarkable speed to burn the Fair- 
mont bridge. He was also the pilot of Imboden at his first 
raid into Tucker County. William Harper was the pilot 
at the second raid. 

In November, 1863, he was sent through to learn the sit- 
uation of the enemy in Tucker County. He came over the 
mountains, and passed the settlements at night, till he ar- 
rived in Tucker, where he set himself to work searching out 
the designs of the enemy. His intimate knowledge of the 
country rendered this an easv task. When he had gotten 

16 " 



242 HISTOEY OF TUOKEK COUNTY. 

tlie desired inforinatioii lie visited his father's house to bid 
his parents good-bye. He had not been there ten minutes 
uhen the house was surrounded by Union sokliers, and 
citizens of the neighborhood who had a spite at him and 
hit on this j^hm to take vengeance. He saw the sokliers in 
front of the house, and started to escape by the back door. 
On the step he was confronted by a squad of sokliers with 
presented guns. They ordered him to surrender. Seeing 
the impossibility of escape and the uselessness of resist- 
ance, he com]:>lied. He unbuckled his belt and let it and 
his pistols fall to the ground. He was then a prisoner. 

It is not the purpose to follow him through the horrors 
of his prison life, except in the briefest manner. He saw 
and endured the rival of Libby and Andersonville. Noth- 
ing bi^t his unconquerable will and his iron constitution 
enabled him to live through it. Carthagenian cruelty was 
surpassed on him, and his lot was worse than that of the 
Chillon Prisoner. 

As soon as he surrendered, some of the men wanted to 
shoot him, and Avould have done so, if not restrained by the 
regular soldiers. The}- carried him to St. George, and 
threw him in jail. It was a cold, November night, and he 
was allowed no fire or blankets. This Avas not enough, and 
the next morning he Avas chained. It was not deemed safe 
to keep him in St. George, because his friends were numer- 
ous and might set him at liberty-. Therefore, he Avas taken 
to IvOAvlesburg and placed under the directions of Captain 
Hall. Hall treated him kindly ; but some of the men 
thirsted for his blood. Several plans Avere laid to kill him ; 
but he and David Li]3scomb succeeded in preventing falling 
into their hands. He Avas confined in the guard-house, 
iiiid even then his enemies tried to assassinate him. He 



TKAVELERS. 243 

always spoke liiglily of the kindness of Captain Hall and 
of most of the men of Company F. 

It was soon deemed advisable to move liim from Rowles- 
burg, and he was taken to Clarksburg and put in prison. 
Great crowds of people came to look at him, and an Irish- 
man exclaimed in surprise : " Faith ! and he is a little man 
to fire a salute over and for the officers to get drunk over, 
when he was captured." He attracted a great deal of atten- 
tion at Clarksburg. The people had all heard of him and 
how he had fleeced the Yankees in Pendleton. From 
Clarksburg he was sent to "Wheeling, and was there chained 
to a post, and all the other prisoners were ordered not to 
speak to him. He passed the time as well as he could. 
The officers paid considerable attention to him, and seemed 
to like to question him concerning his past life. He com- 
municated freely, and won their confidence. They ap- 
peared to think that they were doing him a great honor by 
condescending to talk with him. But he gave them to un- 
derstand that, although a chained prisoner, he was not a 
slave, and would not be forced to praise their tyranny. 
For, when one of them wanted his opinion of the prison, 
expecting him to brag on it and its managers, as compared 
with others. Harper replied that one thing seemed to be 
wanting to render the prison perfect in every particular. 
The officer wanted to know what that was. "A picture on 
the wall, of the Goddess of Liberty in chains," replied Har- 
per, while the officer's countenance fell, and a look of 
shame overspread his face. 

The next day an officer came in and requested him not to 
make so much noise with his chains, as it annoyed them in 
their office. Harper felt this intentional insult, and giving 
the chain a shake of defiance, he said it annoyed him too. 



244 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

and if they did not like to hear it they could take it off. 
AVith this the officer flew into a rage, and heaped abuse and 
calumniation upon the prisoner, and charged him -with 
causing more disturbance on the frontiers than any other 
live men. He tried to browbeat the prisoner into submis- 
sion ; but, in this he failed. Harper defended himself 
against the attacks of the officer, and said that the duty of 
a soldier had always been his rule of action. But, if they 
had any doubt as to whether or not he was a coward they 
might i)ick out six of their men and give him five of his from 
the prison, and they would settle the matter on any terms. 
This offer, of course, was not accepted ; and Harper then 
told them if they would give him six men, he would take 
the town and them in it. He said it was only their coward- 
ice that made them chain him. 

This controversy had a bad effect. It turned the officers 
against him, although they should have admired such a 
display of endurance and independence. But, after that he 
got fcAV manifestations of kindness from them, and it was 
not long before he was carried to Camp Chase. Whether 
his quarrel had anything to do witli the transfer is not 
certain. 

We subjoin an extract from one of his letters. 

I staid two months in Camp Chase. I am told that there were 
three thousand prisoners there; but I cainiot answer for the num- 
ber, because 1 had Httle opportunity for Icnowing. I know how I 
spent my time, and what I saw and suffered, and that is all I wish 
to know or see or hear on the subject. I have read many stories of 
prison life ; and I am, as a general thing, opposed to giving them 
circulation, since they arouse a feeling of hatred and vengeance 
that can do no good. Many of them, too, certainly are exaggera- 
tions, although many are not. You asked me if I thought the 
Union ]ii-isons as bad as the ('onfederate. 1 <'ainiot answer this 



TRAVELERS. 245 

from personal experience, for I was never confined in a Confed- 
erate prison; but I should judge that they were about the same. 
The Rebels often let prisoners Buffer because they had no food or 
shelter for them, and thus there must have been appalling horrors 
in the Southern prisons late in the war; for then the Rebels often 
had only the coarsest rations for their own men in the field. Of 
course, in so great a scarcity of provisions, and in the intense 
hatred that existed, the poor soldiers of the Union, in the Confed- 
erate prisons, must have suffered from hunger, and exposure to 
the weather. You know that my sympathies are with the South 
and always have been, and it is but natural that I should try to 
clear them of the charges of intentional cruelty. I do try to clear 
them. I know the Southern people, I know that they are filled 
with fire, and filled with generosity. It is, therefore, my belief 
that much of their hard treatment of Union prisoners Avas of 
necessity, and if they could they would have been better. 

But, with the Union prisons, this is not the case. They could 
have fed and clothed and sheltered their prisoners if they would 
have done so. Their stores were filled with bread and meat; and 
clothing, even if it must be the worn-out uniform of soldiers, was 
abundant. I endeavor not to let prejudice and national or sec- 
tional hatred influence me in what I say of the war. I fought for 
the South, and I wanted the South to succeed by all honorable 
means; but, since it was not to be so, I think I am man enough to 
free myself from all prejudice, and to consider calmly the issues as 
they then stood. I have no doubt but that much of the barbarity 
in the Northern prisons was due to a spirit of retaliation and re- 
venge. It was modeled, in extent, after the cruelty in Southern 
prisons; and I think the model was surpassed. I can't see how it 
could have been otherwise. 

* « « * ■:•; ■;•:■ «- 

The last night of 1863 was very cold, and we were not allowed 
any fire. But, fifteen men disregarded the orders and kindled fires 
in their stoves. It cost them their lives ; for the guards discovered 
the fires and shot and killed the prisoners as they sat shivering 
round the fires trying to get warm. I supjjose that they were 
buried, but don't know. I know that there was little hurry in 
burying those that died. I have seen them lie two ov three days 



246 HISTOEY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

unattended, and when at last a rough box was brought and the 
corpse placed in it, the box and all was often used a day or two as 
a card-table for the guard, and until decomposition rendered it 
necessary to get rid of it. 

I soon got accustomed to such scenes. But eyery day of my 
prison life I saw something new, and something more shocking 
than I had ever imagined. We know but little of what is in this 
woi-ld ; and we know but little of what human nature, in its de- 
pravity, can be guilty of ; and we know but little of what a man is 
capable of enduring. I had come to look upon Camp Chase as the 
worst place on earth ; and I would gladly have exchanged it for 
anything but death. Wretched as was my condition, I still wanted 
to live, and it was nothing but the stubborn determination to live 
that canned me through. I was there two months in the dead of 
winter, and the time seemed years. I suffered from cold and hun- 
ger and sickness all the time. 

Finally word came that we were to be removed, and we hailed it 
joyfully, for we did not think that any change could be for the 
worse. We learned that we were to be taken to Rock Island 
Prison. We had heard of it, and the reports had been bad enough; 
but, in spite of all we heard, we were glad to get away from Camp 
Chase. 

In February, 1864, we were taken to Chicago on our way to Rock 
Island. We had to walk through Chicago, about one mile. Nine 
out of every ten had frozen hands or feet, and some were so frozen 
and benumbed with the cold that they could scarcely walk. The 
guards here seemed the meanest set of men I had seen. They 
were rough and brutal to the prisoners, and beat us over the head 
and pounded us when they fancied we were not doing right. Some 
of our men were so cut and bruised about the head that the blood 
covered them from head to foot, and often their hats were frozen 
to ther heads with the ice of blood. 

m m m * * tn ^ ^i * 

AVhen at last we landed at the Rock Island Prison, the horror of 
horrors awaited us. It seemed to me that I, like Dante, was pass- 
ing down through the realities of seven hells, and that I was now 
in the deepest pit. There was no necessity of so cruelly treating 
us. If there had been, I Avould be the last man on earth to com- 



TRAVELERS. 247 

plain. But there was no necessity for it. It was open and willful 
determination to torment us, and to torture us with hunger and 
cold and beatings and cursings, and everything revolting that 
could be used against us. I have wondered if the Blackfeet In- 
dians could have been more relentless in their torture of captives. 
We ate everything that would sustain life. The prison officers 
did not seem to care how many of us starved to death. It would 
have been a mercy if they had killed us. 

****** 5i< 

I saw that it was a matter of life and death with me. I was vvil- 
ling to give anything for my life. Some of us were to be exchanged, 
but the lot did not fall on me. I saw a tall fellow, on whom the 
lot had fallen, and I approached him for a trade. I hired him to 
assume my name, and I went in his place. I gave him $7000 in 
money, and sent him enough provisions to last him a year. What- 
ever became of him, I do not know ; but he had a stout constitu- 
tion, and I hope he endured it to the end of the war, and at last 
returned to freedom in the Sunnj^ South. 

Captain Harper was taken to Point Lookout. There lie 
was again confined in a prison, only a little better than 
Rock Island. It was warmer and he had more to eat, which 
were the principal changes for the better. The prisoners 
were kept in tents where the mud was half knee-deep. They 
had one blanket for each two. They staid only two weeks, 
and were then shipped to James River and were turned 
loose within sight of the Confederate lines. 

The war was now drawing to a close. There was great 
need for soldiers in the Rebel armies. They had been 
thinned by a thousand pitched battles, and few recruits 
came in. Worn and exhausted as he was by his dreadful 
suffering and exposure, Harper did what he could for the 
cause that had cost him so much ; but the cause was beyond 
the need of his help. The Avar was over. He was the last 
man to bow in defeat ; but, when it must be done, he did it, 
and acknowledged the power of the victor. 



248 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY 

He wtis not a man to contend without something to be 
gained. It will be seen that, in all his exploits and under- 
takings, he had something definite in view. This was his 
nature. So, when he saw that nothing was to be gained by 
hostilitj- to the North, he buried all his antipathy, and 
turned his energies into other channels, and let the by- 
gones of the war be things of the past. 

He returned to private life, and has since so lived, ex- 
cept when called upon by the vote of his countrymen to 
take office, and then he has done so, and his record as such 
is one of uprightness and honor. Since the close of the 
war he has been once to California, and has visited nearly 
all the Western States. His brothers, Jerome and Thaddeus, 
remained on the Pacific Coast. Thaddeus returned on a 
visit to "West Virginia in 1868, and remained a few weeks. 
On his return to California he encountered terrible snow 
storms in crossing the mountains, and the train was almost 
buried in the drifts. After a length of time the track was 
cleared of the snow, and he arrived in California. He is a 
business man of great success, and has amassed a fortune. 
He is now engaged, among other things, in shipping beef 
from British Columbia. He spends his summers in that 
country and his winters in San Francisco, at the Palace 
Hotel. 

Jerome Harper is dead. He died at Santa Barbara sev- 
eral years ago. He had long been an invalid, and had 
traveled over many parts of the world in search of health. 
He was finally taken, by E. Harper, to the hot springs of 
Santa Barbara, in California, and there he died. 

The further historj- of Captain Harper, his connection 
with the forces of the Confederacy, in Tucker, will be found 
in the chapter on the war. Since the war, except the time 



TRAVELERS. 249 

spent in tlie "West, lie lias liyed on liis farm in the Valley of 
Clover. He has there built the largest dwelling in Tucker 
County, and is one of the most extensive landholders. Of 
late he has engaged extensively in the lumber business. 

None of the Harper brothers, who went to California, 
were ever married. They have always been men of influ- 
ence in whatever calling they have chosen. Captain Har- 
per's record as an officer will be further dealt with in the 
chapter on public officers. 



CHAPTER XV. 

TEA VELERS— CONTINUED. 

Henry Bonnifield is a native of Tucker, although not 
now a* resident. He is a son of A. T. Bonnifield, and a 
grandson of William Corrick, and was born in 1855. While 
very young he manifested a tendency to be foremost iji all 
manner of daring adventures. Climbing trees that other 
boys feared to climb and wading water too deep and swift 
for other boys were his pastime ; and, in the display of his 
belligerent propensities, no lad was too large for him to 
tackle. He was not a perfect specimen of peacefulness and 
resignation ; but his forwardness tended only to romance 
and adventure. Indeed, his very early life gave sign of 
what his after nature would be. He would never be second 
best in anything. With him it was best or nothing. His 
first years were spent in the Sypolt House, that stood 
where now stands the Crawfish Swamp School-house, near 
S. N. Swisher's. From there, with his father, he moved to 
Limestone, and lived on Wild Cat Ridge. It was then a 
hard place, and neighbors were few and far between. But, 
there were trees to climb, and snakes to kill, and springs to 
dabble in, and other mischief to claim his attention until 
his fifth year. 

In 1859 his father took him to California. The passage 
was by water, and was long and rough ; but at last the 
Golden Gate was reached, and the emigrants went out to 
try their fortunes in the new country. Their success in 



TEAVELEKS. 251 

general lias been given in the sketch of A. T. Bonnifield. 
Henry grew more adventurous every year. He soon com- 
menced breaking wild horses, and in a short time he 
became a skillful rider. 

Before his fourteenth year, he left California and took 
passage for United States of Colombia, in South America. 
He was, also, in Mexico, Central Ameiica, and the Isthmus 
of Panama. He sailed upon the Caribbean Sea, among 
the West Indies, on the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic 
Ocean. He was two or three times in the harbor of New 
York, and one time went inland through Pennsylvania, 
New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland, and into West Virginia, 
where he visited the home of his nativity. He staid a year 
in Tucker County. He was now nearly fourteen, and the 
spirit of adventure was in him as strong as ever. One win- 
ter day, when the snow was half knee-deep, he pulled off 
his boots and climbed barefooted to the top of Shafer's 
Mountain, because some boys said that he would not do it. 
He also came near being drowned by wading in water that 
he knew to be over his head, when he could not swim. He 
attended school in Tucker a few months. After a great 
deal of corporal punishment, the teacher gave him up as 
incorrigible. When he saw that all opposition had ended, 
and that there was no more romance in being obstreperous, 
he settled down to his books, and from then to the end of 
the school there was not a better behaved or more studious 
pupil than he. 

The next year he left Tucker and sailed from New York. 
He visited his old ports in the West Indias, Mexico, Central 
and South America, and the next we hear of him he was in 
California. He never again went to sea ; but he now turned 
his attention almost exclusively to breaking wild horses. 



252 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

Of course, he succeeded in this as well, if not better than 
anybody else. He made it, from that time till 1875, his 
profession. 

Breaking wild horses in California is a dangerous opera- 
tion, and none but skillful and daring men can do it. The 
animals are allowed to run wild until their third or fourth 
year. By this time, never having been fed or tamed, they 
are little less wild than deer, and as vicious as lions. When 
an owner desires to break his horses, he collects a company 
of men on horseback, and gives chase to the wild herd. 
The horsemen carry long ropes, at one end of w^hich is a 
running noose, while the other end is made fast to the rider's 
saddle. This noose, or lasso, is thrown over the head of 
the wild horse, which is brought to the ground by the sud- 
den stopping of the herdsman's horse. 

The horse is now caught. It fights like a tiger. It kicks, 
bites and strikes ; but the men keep the lassos tight, and 
the mad animal is soon choked into temporary submission. 
A halter is now forced on him, and a saddle is firmly strap- 
ped to his back. Bridles are not used in breaking horses 
in the far "West. The saddles are very strong, and cost 
from tw^ent}' to one hundred dollars, and weigh thirty or 
forty pounds. The stirrup straps are strong enough to bear 
five hundred pounds each ; and the girth is much stronger. 
It is made of hair ropes woven together. The rider wears 
large spurs, which he digs into the girth and enables him- 
self to keep his seat in the saddle. 

The art of riding these untamed mustangs is no eas}^ one. 
It is easier to learn the management of a locomotive. No 
man who is not strong-breasted, fearless, active and perse- 
vering can ever hope to be even a tolerable rider of such 
horses. Many a man in the Eastern States, who considers 



TEAVELEES. 253 

liimself an excellent rider, would be killed in ten minutes if 
placed on a wild mustang of California. 

Henry Bonnifield made the training of incorrigible horses 
his trade. He charged five dollars a day for his service, 
and was seldom out of employment. Men many miles away 
would send for him Avhen they had a brute that other men 
had failed to conquer. He never failed when he had once 
attempted to subdue a vicious animal. 

On the San Joaquin Eiver, in California, near Fort Mil- 
lerton, was a horse that had never been mastered, but had 
killed more than one brave man. It was a large, powerful 
beast, and had strength of endurance that seemed almost 
miraculous. It was fierce, relentless and had come to be 
looked upon as untamable. No rider could be found wil- 
ling to undertake again to ride the horse. 

Here was a good field in which to win laurels ; for the 
fame of the horse had gone forth over the whole country 
round about, and it was given up that he could not be rid- 
den. Bonnifield was invited to undertake it, and he never 
declined an invitation of that kind. He named a day on 
which he would ride the horse, and on that day a large 
crowd of stockmen, jockeys and rancheros came together to 
witness the performance. 

Bonnifield was a man of one hundred and sixty pounds 
weight, light complexion, and deep blue eyes, and heavy 
built for his weight. He did not look to be a man of more 
than ordinary power ; but, not two men in a thousand of 
his weight could equal him. 

When the time for riding had arrived, the wild horse was 
lassoed and blindfolded. The halter and saddle were fast- 
ened on him, and he was held down till the fearless rider 



254 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

had mounted liim. Then the blindfold was removed, and 
Le was turned loose iipon the plains. 

He at first tried to dismount his rider by the ordinary 
process of plunging and kicking. Leaping high in the air 
and coming down stiff-legged, or "bucking" as it is called 
in western countries, is the most common device of wild 
horses to get rid of their riders. It is, too, in man}- cases, 
and among the inexperienced, quite efficient. For, at times, 
it is almost impossible to keep from being thrown. The 
horse throws his head down, leaving nothing but the saddle 
for the man to hold to, and leaps upward, to left and right, 
and leaves nothing undone to get the rider from the saddle. 
The greatest danger is not that of being thrown to the 
ground, but that resulting from the jolt wdiicli must be re- 
ceived when the horse comes down stiff-legged. It is liable 
to burst the rider's blood-vessels, causing hemorrhage and 
death. To avoid this as much as may be, the stirrup-straps 
are made strong enough to bear the weight of the man and 
he throws his whole weight into his stirrujis. 

When Bomiifield mounted the horse, it kicked and reared 
until it seemed to learn that he was not to be gotten oft" in 
that manner. Then it circled two or three times round the 
field, leaped the fence, and dashed off across the plains with 
whirlwind speed, Bonnifield was powerless to stop or curb 
the enraged animal. He could onl}' hold on to his saddle, 
and go where the horse chose to go. This was across a 
plain three miles to the foot of a rugged hill, called Miller- 
ton Mountain. No rider and horse had ever gone up its 
rugged sides. Such a feat was thought to be impossible, if, 
indeed, it had ever been thought of at all. The bluft" was 
bare of trees, and was cut up with steep gullies, some of 
which were twenty feet from side to side and twice that 



TPvAYELEES. 255 

deep. In places the ground was strewn with rocks and 
bowlders ; and at others the hill rose almost pei-pendicular 
for hundreds of feet. 

Bonnifield thought that the horse would change its course 
when it reached the base of the hill ; but such it did not. 
It passed up the rugged slope with the ease and rapidity of 
an eagle ; nor steepness, nor rocks, nor ravines, nor an}'- 
thing checked the speed of its flight. Before it could 
scarcely be realized, the summit was reached, where, before 
rider and horse, extended a wild and broken plain, so 
thickly strewn with bowlders as to hide the ground. Across 
the plains, among the rocks, ran deep ravines, which the 
rains and floods of ages had worn in the granite formation. 
They wound zigzag and at random, and were invisible until 
their very brinks were reached. 

"When the horse arrived at the edge of the plain, he 
boomed across it with swiftness that increased rather than 
diminished. The rocks were nothing in his way. He leaped 
from one to another, or cleared them at a leap. Scarcely 
might one observe that he touched the ground. He was a 
poM'erful animal, and his spirits and animosit}- were getting 
fully aroused. 

Through the middle of the plain ran a dangerous gully, 
so hidden that it could not be seen until its A-erv brink was 
reached. The horse knew not and cared not that it was 
there. He cared not for anything; and the rougher the 
way the more reckless he ran, and the more vicious were 
his efforts to unhorse his rider. 

Bonnifield saw the ravine just as the horse reached its 
brink, and it was too late to turn. He must go headlong 
into it. No bottom could be seen; but it is now known 
that it was over forty feet deep. As the fearful leap was 



356 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

made, Bonnitield threw liis feet from the stirrups, read}' to 
spring from the saddle just as the bottom should be reached. 
This was to avoid being caught under the falling horse and 
crushed. It was a flight through the air, and a long one ; 
but, instead of going to the bottom, the horse cleared the 
chasm, and slacked not his speed. Further on were other 
ravines equally dangerous ; but none were wide enough or 
deep enough to stop the horse or to turn him from his 
course. He reached the furthest limit of the plain, and was 
ready for the descent, if descent were possible. 

It looked impossible. The plain ended on the brow of a 
bluff which, seen from above, looks perpendicular ; but it is 
not quite vertical. The horse had noAv run five miles, yet 
showed no sign of stopping or of giving up. He turned 
obliquely along the mountain side, and thus made descent 
possible. This was the most dangerous part of the course. 
The jolting started the blood from the nose and mouth of 
the rider. But there was no alternate but to leap from the 
saddle, which probably would have been fatal. So, down, 
down, down, as they had a few minutes before gone up, up, 
up, went rider and horse. Rocks, gullies and ravines were 
passed, none know how, for no other horseman has ever 
passed them and lived. It looked like going doAvn into the 
Valley of Death. 

The horse, from the first, had been beyond control, and 
by the time the foot of the mountain was again reached, he 
was more furious and curbless than ever. The halter, 
Avliich, at best, was of little use, was now broken, and one 
stirrup was torn awa}-. Bonnifield still kept in the saddle, 
although it was doubtful how long he might be able to do 
so. He could have ' ridden better without a saddle than 
with a broken one. He crossed the plains witli a speed that 



TRAVELERS. 257 

slackened not. Already he liad ridden nine miles, and the 
blood was flowing fast from his nose and mouth. He knew 
not when the perilous race would end. 

At this crisis some horsemen came to his rescue, and tried 
to stop the runaway animal ; but still it was the fleetest on 
the field and led the race across the plains. Finally, a man 
on a swift horse succeeded in getting near enough for Bon- 
nifield to seize the horn of the saddle, and he was thus 
dragged from the wild brute, which dashed on and Avas las- 
soed on the praii'ie some miles away. It was some weeks 
before Bonnifield was again able to ride ; for the jolting had 
seriously injured him, and he has never fully recovered 
from it. But he again undertook the horse, and staid with 
it until the untamable beast killed itself by Ijreaking its 
neck. 

This was Bonnifield's longest ride of so savage a nature; 
but he had others that came as near proving fatal, although 
he lived through them all. 

Perhaps the greatest d anger connected with the riding of 
wild horses is that they will throw theniselves and that the 
rider will either be crushed or hang in the stirrup and be 
dragged when the horse regains its feet. About a year 
after the dash over Millerton Mountain, Bonnifield met a 
misfortune of this kind. The horse that he was riding threw 
itself. He tried to spring off and free his feet from the 
stirrups. But the animal fell upon him and he was held 
fast. His spur was driven into the thick girth, and when 
the horse sprang up, Bonnifield's foot hung in the stirrup. 
It Avas a perilous situation, even with a tame horse, and 
much more so A\-ith a wild one. 

Such riders carry a long rope, one end of which is tied 

17 



258 HISTOKY OF TUCKEE COUNTY. 

to tlie halter, and tlie otlier is rolled into a coil and tucked 
under the rider's belt. This is for the purpose of holding 
the horse, if the rider gets off, accidentally or otherwise. 
It is so fixed that it will uncoil without endangering the man. 

As soon as Bonnifield saAv that he was hanging in the 
stirrup, he seized the rope, which was fast to the horse's 
halter, and pulled the animal's head round toward him, and 
held him there with an iron hand. The horse ran and 
plunged and kicked and fell, and tried to stamp him, and 
was not onh' frightened, but Avas enraged, and endeavored 
to kill him. He saw that his only hope Avas in preventing 
it from trampling upon him. He was thus dragged up and 
down the field. The horse Avas so held that it could run 
only sidewise, and it was this alone that saved Bonnifield 
from being stamped to death. Several times he tried to 
get his knife to cut the stirrup strap, but as often failed to 
do so. 

A man half-mile away saw the wild horse galloping up 
and down the field, dragging the unhorsed rider after him ; 
and, mounting a horse, he hurried off' to the rescue. But, 
when he came up, he coidd render no assistance, because 
whenever he got ahead of the mustang, it would turn. But 
Bonnifield finally succeeded in getting his knife from his 
pocket, and, cutting the strap of the stirrup, set himself at 
lil.)erty. 

He did not, for a moment, give up his profession of 
breaking wild horses. He was sent for, and was paid fabu- 
lous prices to ride horses that no one else could ride. At 
this time he Avas considered one of the very best riders in 
California. He took pride only in doing that Avliich no one 
else could do ; and for that reason he did not like to ride a 
horse tliat anybod}- else had successfully ridden. 



TEAVELEES. 259 

It was about this time that he was sent for to ride a mule 
that had baffled several good riders. He went ; and when 
he found that the mule was a miserable little runt, hardly 
waist high to a man, he thought they were only trying to 
get a job on him. He considered it beyond the range of all 
probabilities that such a thing as that should be unmanage- 
able. However, when they insisted that it was no prank, 
he lit his pipe, and got on, still with some misgivings that 
all was not right. But he was soon cleared of doubt. He 
has always frankly acknowledged that if that mule had 
been as big as a horse, and as vicious according, he could 
not have ridden it. As it was, it was a ridiculous victory. 
It bucked without a pause for two hours. The part of his 
pipe stem that was between his teeth he still held ; the rest, 
with the pipe, was jolted off and gone. All the buttons of 
his coat were jarred off. Everything in his pockets had 
been spilt out. His boot-heels and his hat were gone ; and 
nearly every seam in his clothes had given way. He was 
a victor, and probably felt like one ; but he looked like 
something else. 

Much hard riding was beginning to tell on him. His 
constitution was giving way. A long ride on a runaway 
horse, not unlike that over Millerton Mountain, was the last 
of the kind that he ever has undertaken. His lungs were 
so injured that it was long before the hemorrhage could be 
checked ; and he was forced to abandon his profession. 

This was about 1875, his twentieth year. His fame had 
gone out over more countries than one, so that, when 
a Centennial commissioner, in 1876, visited California to 
procure wild-horse riders to exhibit at Philadelphia, he 
was directed, first of all, to see Henry Bonnifield. He vis- 
ited him, and was fully satisfied that there had been no 



1 



260 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

misrepresentation. He offered liim a free passage to and 
from Phiadelpliia, to bear all his expenses during the sum- 
mer, and to pay him fifty dollars a month besides. Bonni- 
field reluctantly declined the offer, because his weak lungs 
•would not endure rough riding. Besides, he was making a 
hundred dollars a month at other business. 

California, however, was getting too tame for him, and he 
began looking about for a more romantic field. At this 
time Arizona was attracting much attention, and many 
adventurers were wending thither to try their fortune in the 
half-explored wilds of that desert country. 

In the summer of 1877, in his twenty-second year, with a 
single companion, he set out on horseback for Arizona. 
They started from Fresno, and that night camped at an 
old mud house on the shore of Lake Tulare. The house 
may be especially mentioned on account of its dark legends. 
Part are no doubt myths and superstition, but part are too 
true to be doubted. The house had been a tavern in early 
mining days ; and, since it was on the road to Owen's River 
Mines, and was twenty or thirty miles from any other house, 
it was of necessity a frequent stopping place for travelers. 
Many are the dark stories told of murders and robberies 
there, and of many a poor miner, whose hard earned sav- 
ings of years were taken from him, and himself murdered 
and hidden in the sand. The superstitious people of the 
country now think that the house is haunted of ghosts and 
of spirits of the departed who died of violence, and hardly 
ever does anyone venture near the house. 

Bonnifield and his friend stopped at the Haunted House 
of Tulare partly because so few others would dare do it, and 
partly because it was at the end of a hard day's ride. The 
next day they proceeded into Kern Count}^ and shaped their 



TEAVELEKS. 261 

course for Walker's Pass, where they would cross the 
mountains into the Mojave Desert. In the upper part of 
Kern, a few farmers were trying to till the soil ; but, it had 
been dry for a year, and the never-ceasing winds had 
driven the sand in drifts till all the fences, but the tops of 
the posts, were buried. They could get no feed for their 
horses at noon; and late that evening they came to a 
small lot of clover, where lived a frontier emigrant by a 
stream of water. They wanted to stay with him that night, 
but he drove them away, telling them, however, that they 
could get good pasture ten miles further. They rode on 
ten or fifteen miles without seeing any indication of pasture, 
but, to the contrary, the country got drier and more desert 
like. About dark they met a Mexican who told them that 
it was seventy miles to the nearest point where feed could 
be had, and fifty to the nearest water. Having closely 
questioned the Mexican, and having satisfied themselves 
that he was telling the truth, they determined to go back 
and feed their horses on the lying emigrant's clover. 

This they did. They rode back, and told him how that 
he had dealt deceitfully with them, and had sent them and 
their horses hungry into the desert to starve. He acknowl- 
edged all, and gave one and another excuse. They fed 
their horses on his clover, and the next morning paid him 
five dollars for it. 

They now passed through the mountains and struck 
boldly across the wide, sandy plains of the Mojave Desert. 
The ground was covered with alkali, soda and salt, and in 
places was as white as snow. It was entirely without grass 
or trees ; but, at intervals there were copses of thorny sage- 
brush, and in other places were groves of cactus, of a won- 
derful and peculiar kind. It grew from ten to twenty feet 



262 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

higli, witli a tnink a foot in diameter. This is covered with 
scales like corn husks, and at the top is a bundle of long 
dry leaves, like sole-leather. 

As they were galloping along they saw a carriage coming 
to meet them. When it drew near, they observed that it 
contained a man, a woman and two children. Bonnifield 
and his friend perhaps would not have remembered the 
incident, had not the man, when he saw them coming, 
stopped his team and taking up his double-barreled shot- 
gun, stood by the road, with the gun cocked and ready to 
fire. He did this fearing that they were robbers. They 
passed on, and he resumed his way. 

It was a hot day, and not till they had ridden fifty miles 
did they find water. After that, the same day, they rode 
eighty miles further, making for the entire day a ride of 
one hundred and thirty miles across the sandy desert. 

They crossed the Colorado River near Fort Mojave, and 
reached Prescott, in Arizona. It was a mining country and 
all mining places are rough. It was a dull time, and Bon- 
nifield could do no better than to drive a mule-team for 
sixty dollars a month. He had three train-wagons and 
eighteen mules, all in one team, and with them he hauled 
quartz from the mines. The country was dry and hot, and 
the work was very hard. He kept at it for some months, and 
until he had a better offer, that of working on a hay-farm, 
where hay sold for one hundred dollars a ton. He accept- 
ed the offer, and turned his attention to farming. At this he 
succeeded well for a while ; but, he got sick, and was unable 
to fill his place on the farm. The proprietor discharged 
him, and turned him out to die. He lay several days in the 
shade of tlie cactus trees, in hope that he would recover. 
But he got no better, and he saw that he must die if he re- 



TEAVELERS. 263 

mained tliere, for no one came near to bring liim water or 
anything to eat. 

He liad an aquaintance in a mining camp about tliree 
hundred miles distant, and lie tlionglit if lie could reacli 
tliere lie could get medicine. It was tliree hundred miles by 
the road, or one hundred and fifty across the desert and 
over the mountains where there was no road. He decided 
to cross the desert, and thought he could make the trip in 
two days on horseback. 

Early the next morning he saddled his horse and started, 
with two canteens of water tied to his saddle, and a few 
pounds of oatmeal and salt to do him for provisions on the 
journey. He struck boldly into the desert, and directed his 
course by the sun, and the peaks of distant mountains. He 
was too weak to ride fast, so that he had proceeded only 
forty or fifty miles by the middle of the afternoon. There 
he found some water in a hole among the rocks, and some 
dry grass in bunches here and there. He felt exhausted, 
and decided to rest there till morning. He tied his horse 
by a long rope so that it could feed on the dry grass, and 
having eaten his dinner of oatmeal he lay down in the shade 
of the rocks to sleep. 

When he awoke, it was dark. He got up to see about his 
horse. Scarcely had he moved when the whizzing of rattle- 
snakes about him admonished him of his danger. Tlie 
snakes had lain hidden in their dens during the heat of the 
day ; but, when night came, they crawled out. Tliere is in 
that country a species of snakes known as " side-winders," 
because they cannot crawl, but roll along side wise. They 
are exceedingly poisonous, and the Indians have no cure 
for their bite. When an Indian is bitten by one of them, ho 
sings his death song, wraps himself in his blanket and dies. 



264 HI8T0RY OF TUCKER COUNTY. ] 

When Boiinitiekl awoke and heard the snakes rattling 
about him, he sprang to his feet, struck matches, and found 
Lis way to his horse, which had not been bitten. He left 
the place as soon as possible. There are probably more 
rattlesnakes in Arizona than in any other country of the 
world. But, they are not as apt to bite as they are in 
some other places. 

He rode on in what he supposed to be the direction. 
From the height of the moon he judged it to be about three 
o'clock in the morning. But, after traveling an hour he be- 
gan to notice that instead of getting lower, the moon rose 
higher. From this he judged that it must be about ten 
o'clock. Counting from this, he reasoned that he had got- 
ten turned around and was not traveling in the right direc- 
tion. He now became confused, and could not tell which 
way to go. It Avas worse than useless to ride in the wrong 
direction ; and he dismounted to wait for day. Having 
found a spot free from snakes, he lay down and slept and 
awakened not till the sun was shining full in his face. He 
started up confused, and was burning with a high fever. He 
could not at tirst realize Avhere he was or whither he was 
going, AYhen he had settled this in his own mind, he looked 
for the mountains that had guided him the day before. He 
could sec mountains everywhere, but could not recognize 
those to which he was going. 

He decided to the best of his judgment which way he 
should go, and started. In about two hours he came to the 
brink of a deep canon, of which no crossing Avas visible. 
Such ravines there are called Box Canons, and they may 
extend a hundred miles with no place where even a footman 
may cross. Their sides are ]:)erpendicular, and are some- 
times overgrown with thorns. When Bonnifield reached 



TEAVELERS. 265 

the edge of the cliff, he stopped short, for he had not seen 
it until that instant. As far as he could see in both direc- 
tions extended the canon like a deep ditch. After a mo- 
ment's consideration, he turned to the right, and traveled 
along the chasm, looking for a place to cross. Thus he 
traveled all that day till evening, and could find no way to 
pass over. 

He had brought two canteens of water with him from the 
camping place of the previous evening. Of this he had 
drank all he wanted, but his horse had had none. He 
emptied one of the canteens into his hat and gave his horse 
to drink, and, letting him pick dry grass for an hour, ^nd 
having eaten his oa\ti supper, he set forward again along the 
canon to find a crossing. It was a fruitless search. He 
rode till after midnight, when from the exhaustion of him- 
self and horse he was obliged to stop. His horse fed on 
what it could find, and he slept on the sand till morning. 
His canteens now contained no water, and his fever and the 
fatigue of travel caused a \dolent thirst, while his horse 
seemed famished for drink. 

It was death to stay where he was ; so he traveled on all 
that day, not seeing any animal, bird, bug or any living 
thing, except his horse. Just before sunset his horse gave 
out. He dismounted, and was himself barely able to walk. 
But he sa^y that it would not do to remain there. He took 
off his saddle and turned the horse loose to save itself if it 
could. With his canteens over his shoulder, he set forward 
on foot. He found a place where he could get down into 
the canon, although he could see no way up the opposite 
side. He climbed down into it, about three hundred feet, 
and found the bottom full of deep holes, like wells. He 
commenced sounding them to find their depths and to see 



^i 



266 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

if there might not be water iu some of them. To some he 
found no bottom, and others he found dry ; but he contin- 
ued his work till late at night, and until the moon had risen. 
In one, a stone let fall splashed in water. Quick as possi- 
ble, he fastened a canteen to a twine, and tied on a stone to 
sink it, and let it down into the v/ell. He drew it up filled 
with cool water, and having satisfied his thirst as much as 
he thought safe, he ate his supper. 

He now determined to go back and get his horse. He 
filled his canteens, and found a path leading up the cliff close 
by the well. When he reached the plain above, he hung 
his coat on a rock to mark the place, and went back after 
his horse, about four miles. He found the animal Ipng by 
the saddle. He poured the water in his hat, and the horse 
drank and got up. He rode to where his coat had been left, 
and there tied him and carried up water for him until he 
was satisfied. By this time it was breaking day, and Bon- 
nifield was unable to walk any more. He fell asleep under 
the rocks, and slept half the day. 

When he awoke, he carried water till his horse was again 
satisfied, and with full canteens he mounted his horse and 
moved on. His supply of parched oatmeal was getting low, 
and he had no idea when he would get out of the desert. 
His idea was to cross the canon, if he could, and if not fol- 
low it to the Colorado River, if it went there. 

The plains were hot, and there were no signs of life about, 
until he passed the crest of a low hill, when just in front of 
him he saw a party of men sitting and standing among the 
rocks. At first sight, he thought that they were Indians, 
and he wheeled his horse to gallop away. But they called 
to him in English, and he halted. They all nished at him, 
and he again galloped off, feeling certain that they meant 



TEAVELEES. 267 

him no good, altliongli lie could not devine wliat tliey really- 
meant. 

They were gold hnnters who had penetrated that region 
in search of mines. They lost their way, and had wandered 
two days mthont water. So extreme was their thirst that 
the}^ had opened the veins of their arms, and were sucking 
the blood when Bonnifield came up. They were crazy 
for water, and they tried to surround him to get his can- 
teens. He soon understood their purpose, and kept out of 
their way. He would have given them the water, but, he 
knew not where he was to get more, and he could not 
starve himself for them. He told them where they could 
find water, and they told him where he could cross the 
canon, and thus they parted. 

A few miles further he found the path across the ravine, 
and before dark he was upon the further side. He let his 
horse graze a few hours, and again he proceeded over the 
crusty salt that covered the desert. 

He found no more water that night, or the next day. At 
noon he gave his horse the contents of one canteen, and he 
kept the other for himself. On all sides as far as he could 
see was a waste solitude of rocks, sand, salt and now and 
then a clump of sage-brush, or cactus, or a bunch of grass. 
The land seemed entirely void of living beings. Not even 
the snakes were now to be seen. 

In the evening he began again to feel the pangs of thirst, 
and his horse began to weaken. But there was no water at 
hand. When night came, he did not stop ; for, it was now 
a matter of life or death. To stop was death. He urged 
his horse forward, and searched among all the rocks and 
pits for water. He could find none. The landscape, hov- 
ered over by the shadows of night, grew more weird and 



268 HISTOEY OF TUCKER COUNTY 

desolate than ever ; and tlie thick crust of salt that cracked 
and broke under the horse's hoofs, was all that produced a 
sound to break the silence of the desert. He was not wan- 
dering aimlessly, although he knew not whither he was 
going. Awhile before midnight he caught the glimpse of a 
fire in the distance. Nothing but men builds fires, there- 
fore men must be there, and he spurred forward as fast as 
his jaded horse could carry him. The fire was many miles 
away, and he was a long time in reaching it. When he 
drew nearer, he could discern that there were more fires 
than one. 

When he came up, his ears were assailed by whoops and 
yells and howls that informed him that the fires were the 
encampment of a large band of Apache Indians, who are, 
of all Indians, the most blood-thirsty. His thirst overcame 
his fear, and he rode boldly into camp and addressed them 
in English. They started up and gathered around him, and 
one or two who could speak a little English questioned him 
as to who he was, where he was going and what he wanted. 
He gave ready answers, and made himself as much at home 
as he could. Still he could see that they looked upon him 
with suspicion. They seemed to fear that there was a large 
company of whites near, and that he was only a spy sent 
into the camp. Some of the Indians immediately started 
oflf in every direction, to explore if there was any danger. 

Bonnifield dismounted and called for water, which they 
brought. Then some of them took his horse to water and 
pasture, and did everything they could to make him feel 
welcome. He tried to feel safe, but he could not. However, 
he talked and laughed, and hid all signs of fear. He divided 
his tobacco among them, and they brought him meat and 
cactus-apples. Ji was a large camp, and he was entirely at 



TEAVELEKS. 269 

the mercy of the savages. But they did him no harm. He 
slept by their fire, and they furnished him with the best 
they had. 

The next morning they brought his horse, well fed and 
watered, and gave him provisions to take with him on his 
journey. They directed him where to find the camp to 
which he was going, and, with an improved opinion of the 
wild Apaches, he left them. 

During the rest of his journey he found water oftener, 
but the country was wild and desolate. He became en- 
tangled in a jungle of thorny cactus, and suffei'ed much be- 
fore he could free himself. The cactus is covered with long, 
tough briers, which, when' old, curl in the manner of fish 
hooks. They are very hard to break, and when fixed in a 
man's clothes, he is firmly held. Those that have not 
curled, are very sharp and straight, and are so barbed that 
when they have once penetrated it is hard to withdraw 
them. Bonnifield had a serious time in the jungle. He 
was torn by the thorns, and one entered his arm so deeply 
that he could not draw it out, and it has never been gotten 
out. 

At the end of seven days he reached the camp to which 
he was going. He was only a walking skeleton, and his 
horse was little better. Many a man would never have got- 
ten through ; but his energy and perseverance overcame all 
he met, and he saved his life by it. At £he camp he found 
friends who gave him what help they could ; but at best it 
was not the care that his broken health demanded. He re- 
covered slowly from the fever and his memorable seven 
days' ride. 

As soon as he was able to travel, he determined upon 
returning to California. The best route was to descend the 



270 HISTOKY OF TUCKEK COUNTY. 

Colorado to Fort Mojave, where lie could go by steamboat 
to Fort Yuma, and tlience north through California by 
railroad. 

The Colorado River, above Fort Mojave, is swift, rough 
and dangerous, and in low water is navigable only for small 
canoes. It flows hundreds of miles through a deep gorge, 
called Grand Canon, whose walls are of solid rock, hundreds 
and some of them thousands of feet high. The scenery is 
beautiful and grand, and since the completion of the Bow 
String R. R. through northern Arizona, many tourists go 
there to look at the wonders. But when Bonnifield was 
there, it was all in the remotest corners of the world, and 
none but daring explorers and reckless adventurers had ever 
been permitted to see it. 

Bonnifield visited the Indian chief who claimed that 
region, and bargained for guides to take him in a canoe to 
Fort Mojave. The Indians tried to persuade him from 
undertaking the trip at that season of low water, telling 
him that it was exceedingly dangerous. But he was resolved 
to go, and for a few dollars bought two of them to take him. 

"^Che channel of the river is filled with rocks, around and 
over which the water plunges in cataracts and whirlpools. 
One must be acquainted with the channel, or he can never 
get through, even with the smallest canoe. The Indians 
whom Bonnifield bought claimed that they knew the river, 
and probably they did ; but they were treacherous fellows, 
and he contracted a disliking for them from the first. Prob- 
ably the feeling of antipathy was mutual, for they manifested 
no strong affection for him. They watched him, and he 
seldom took his eyes off of them. It was not a pleasant 
ride, as the canoe shot down the rapids, and whirled in the 
eddies, and darted through clouds of s]")ray to emerge in 



TKAVELEKS. 271 

tlie sunlight or shadows beyond. One Indian stood in the 
bow and acted as pilot, while the other steered from the 
stern. The pilot gave all his orders by motioning his hand. 
They went very rapidly, although they floated only with 
the current, except when a short space of still water was 
reached. From the suspicious conduct of the Indians, 
Bonnifield was led to believe that they were plotting to kill 
him. He thought it best, not only to be on guard, but to 
disarm them. They each had a gun. When they went to 
shore, on an island, to cook their supx^ers, he took from 
them their guns and knives, and kept them in his posses- 
sion. They raised a stormy fuss about his arbitrary pro- 
ceedings ; but, he threatened them with everything horrible 
if they attempted to resist. They jdelded the point, and 
turned to getting supper. He had to watch them more 
closely than ever ; because they now had occasion to kill 
him. He thought this bold course wisest. He slept none 
that night, although he affected to do so to test whether 
they vv-ould fall upon him in his sleep. He thought that 
they would not, but was unwilling to risk them. 

Early the next morning the}^ proceeded down the river. 
He arranged a plan to sleep without letting the Indians 
know it. He fixed his blankets on a frame, and lay under 
them. He punched nail-holes in them, so that he could 
see out, but the Indians could not see in, and having for- 
bidden them on pain of death to ax^proach him, he was 
tolerably safe. They could not tell whether he was asleej) 
unless they would lift the blankets. This they were afraid 
to do lest he should be awake and shoot them. In this 
manner he slept some ; but, his slumbers were light. 

When he reached Fort Mojave the smoke-stack of the 
Government steamboat was just passing out of sight down 



272 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

the river. It would not be back for a month, and he would 
have to remain there that time. He discharged his Indian 
guides, and they went off. He spent the month with that 
impatience known or imagined only by those who know the 
torment of waiting only a few hours for a railroad train that 
is behind time. Bonnifield said that the whistle of the 
steamboat, as it came up the river toward the fort after its 
month's absence, was the joyfullest sound that man or na- 
ture has ever caused to greet the ears of mortal. He pur- 
chased passage and was carried to Fort Yuma, whence there 
were railroad connections with his home in California. 

When he reached home, he turned his attention to busi- 
ness, and discarded his romantic ideas. He has since lived 
as a farmer, and raises annually from three hundred to one 
thousand acres of wheat. 

His wild riding and many hardships have told materially 
on his constitution, although he is still equal to almost any 
man of his weight. He still refuses to be surpassed by any- 
body, and his powers of endurance are as remarkable as 
ever. A few years ago in the hurry of harvest, he fell and 
broke his arm ; but he would not stop work an hour. He 
drove the header for three days with the most stoical indif- 
ference, and until inflammation brought on a fever, and for 
weeks his life was despaired of. He finally recovered. 

Although he fears nothing, and has passed through al- 
most everything of excitement and danger all his life ; yet 
so tender are his feelings, that he will not drown a kitten. 
He is still (1884) under thirty years of age, and lives in 
Fresno County, California. 



iMiniftMirtitt'wi 





A. P. MlNEAR. 



11 



CHAPTER XVI. 
TI2A VELEES—CONTIXLTEJj. 

The energy and ability of the founders of St. George, tlie 
old Minear family, have been inherited by their descendants 
ever since. Had the Minears remained in Tucker and 
devoted themselves to its development as they have to the 
development of distant states, our county would be the 
better off. As it is, the influence which this family has had 
upon the growth and prosperity of this section, not only of 
Tucker, but of neighboring counties, has been not a little, 
and of the most permanent kind. But, unfortunately for 
their native count}-, but fortunately for other counties, they 
have, of late years, sought their fortunes and exerted their 
influence beyond the narrow and rugged confines of Tucker. 

Of Enoch Minear's nine children, only one, David S. 
Minear, has made Tucker County his home from his child- 
hood to the present time. Like his father, his grandfather 
and his ancestors as far back as tradition runs, he has made 
a business of agriculture, and has tilled the. old farm that 
his fathers had tilled for a hundred 3'ears before him. On 
the farm, just in the suburbs of the village of St. George, 
and the oldest house in it, stands the grim old stone house 
that has stood the storms of three-quarters of a century, 
and is still firm and durable. For generations it was the 
homestead of the Minear family, although it is deserted of 
them now. Within its ponderous walls was reared that 
family of nine, who have novr gone forth into distant lands, 
and some have gone whither no traveler ever returns. The 
farm on which tliev lived Avas one of the' finest in the 



^1 



274 HISTOEY OF TUCKER COUNTY 

county, and it Avas kept a model of neatness and pros- 
perity. The family was indiistrious, and no idleness was 
tolerated. Enoch Minear, the head of the famil}', was a 
hard-working man, and he taught his family the same be- 
lief. Indeed, in the hot summer and in hours of languid- 
iiess, his bo3S used to imagine tliat they were kept at work 
more than was good for their health and enjoyment. Early 
in the morning, before the first dawn of day, he would 
thunder on their room doors with his cane and call to them : 
*'Out of tliat ! Now's the time to hoe corn while it's cool! " 
and he never left the door until every yawning bo}' was 
dressed and on his way down stairs. The sleepy youngsters 
filed silently to the barn, harnessed the horses, hitched to 
old shovel ]ilows, and, while some tore back and forth be- 
tween the corn -rows, playing havoc with the weeds and 
briers, and throwing fresh soil to the young corn, others 
followed A\'ith broad-hoes and hacked down what Aveeds the 
plows had missed, and straightened the stalks which the 
horses had trampled down. There were no idlers there. 
Each one had something to do, and the work could not be 
slighted. If a roAV of corn Avas not Avell hoed, it Avas a sad 
settlement to be made Avith the one in fault. 

The summer days, from so early in the morning, Avere very 
long. From the first dawn till noon Avas almost equal to an 
ordinary day. The boys Avorked unceasingl}', but still found 
time to Avatch the sun and to take note of the marvelous 
sloAvness Avith Avhich their shadoAvs moved from the Avest to 
the north. Wlien the shadoAv pointed north, it Avas noon. 
That truth of astronomical geography is avcII known to all 
the farmer boys in the Avorld, and, about ten o'clock, Avhen 
it has been a long time sim-e breakfast and is still a long 
time till dinner, thev are at a loss to discern Avhether the 



TEAVELEES. 275 

shadow is moving at all or not, but are tempted to believe 
that, like old Joshua of the Scripture, they have enemies 
to evercome, and the sun is standing still to allow them 
ample time for the performance of the work. 

When the horn blew for dinner, the tired, hungry boys 
forgot their troubles and went trooping home. After the 
horses were attended to they ate their own dinners. The 
bill of fare was that of the farmer, not costly or uncommon, 
but sufficient ; and, it is doubtful, if in all their travels, these 
boys have ever found anything better than Avas their meal 
of corn bread, pork, butter, milk and vegetables, when they 
come in at noon from eight hours of hard work in the swel- 
tering heat. 

"Now bo3's," their father would say as soon as they were 
done eating and had just flung themselves down in the 
shady yard on the grass to rest, "now boys, now's the time 
to hoe corn and kill the weeds while it's hot." So, up he 
got and up he made them get, and in a very few minutes 
the whole procession was moving majestically oft" for the 
corn-field for seven or eight hours more work. 

Enoch Minear taught industry' to his family as he taught 
them moralit}'. He considered it necessary as a part of 
their education. They learned the lesson, and were never 
the less fortunate for it. 

The subject of popular education in Tucker Avas now 
coming more before the people, and a greater interest was 
taken in it. As yet, there were no public schools. This 
period ma}' be supposed to extend from 1845 to 18GU. St. 
George was not even a ^dllage then, at least not in 1845. It 
did not contain the number of inhabitants that it contained 
sixty years before. 

Wliile there was no public scho(»l, yet there was always a 



1 



276 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

school in St. George during the winter. The teacher was 
paid from private p^^rses, and several pupils came fr'om 
the country to attend. Sometimes there was a school in 
the summer time. In 1856 there was a summer school that 
has been especially remembered by those who attended. 

In 1859 the St. George Inn was built. It was managed 
for nearly twenty years by Adam Tate, Esq., and was a 
model tavern of the kind. Its comforts and hospitality were 
proverbial the country over, and it was patronized by law- 
yers from neighboring counties, by cattle-dealers, by the 
traveling public and by the people of the suiTounding coun- 
try. The same house has been a tavern ever since, except 
for a 3'ear or two while it was owned by George I. Tucker, 
Esq. It is now the property of Mr. M. V. Miller, and has 
recently^been refitted and refurnished until it is one of the 
best houses in the town. 

The school of 1856 was taught by Prof. George E. Selby ; 
and, in addition to the pupils in and about St. George, otliei*s 
attended from a distance. Among those who came fr'om 
the country were Abe Bonnifield, A. H. Bonnifield, S. N. 
Swisher, Edgar Parsons, C. L. Parsons and others. In this 
school Abe Bonnifield took the prize for excelling in reading. 
The school has always been remenibered by those Avho at- 
tended it as one of great thoroughness and completeness ; 
and it may not be amiss to claim for it a greater influence 
for good than that of any other school ever taught in the 
count3^ It was taught in a house that stood and still stands 
just back of the present school house of St. George. The 
building was originally a saw-mill, standing some two miles 
Ijelow the town, arid was moved to its present site and re- 
l5uilt by Enoch Minear. To liim was due tlie first school 
in St. George, after tlio formation of Tuekor. He paid the 



TEAYELEES. 277 

teacher from his own pocket, and threw open the doors of 
school to all who would make use of it. The offer was 
accepted by many, and before the commencement of sum- 
mer the enrollment was as large as it has eA'er been in 
St. George. 

Enoch Minear then kept tftvern in the old stone house, 
and many of the pupils boarded with him. But Abe Bon- 
nifield, A. H. Bonnifield and David Bonnifield boarded at 
home, four and one-half miles distant, and S. N. Swisher, 
then of Hampshire County, boarded with them, and they all 
came to school together. 

Before that time, and several years before, there had been 
schools in and near St. George. Enoch Minear had always 
been a liberal patronizer of popular education. His family 
received the benefit of the best instruction the country 
could afford. But, even at this time, 1856, his family were 
not all with him. Some had gone to the remotest parts of 
the United States to try their fortunes there. The land of 
California had attracted their notice when it first became 
known to the world as a field of gold. Capt. E. Hai-per, 
who started to that region early in 1848, was the first of 
Tucker's people to dare the dangers of the land of adven- 
ture. But others in a very short time were to follow, and 
the next one was A. P. Minear, Enoch Minear's oldest son. 

On Saturday, March 10, 1849, at the supper table, in the 
old stone mansion, Enoch Minear said to his oldest son: 
"Pool," that was the name by which he was known, "Pool, 
to-day you are twenty-one years of age. You may either 
stay with me or go 'root' for yourself, as 3^ou like." Now, 
for the first time. Pool realized that he was fully a man, and 
ought to depend upon himself. He was always a whole- 
souled, generous boy, who was respected by all, and by all 



278 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

known as a youth of intellect, energy and ambition. It was 
plain to any one that he would make his way in the world, 
no matter in what field he should seek his fortune. On the 
home farm, from his childhood, he had been a leader of his 
brothers. This right was partly due him, because he was 
the oldest ; but, his perseveraifce and his ambition gave him 
this position more than was given by his age. 

At the supper table, on that Saturday evening, was a 
neighbor, Mr. Jacob See, a man, as has been said of him, 
whose worth was unknown until he was gone. He heard 
what had been said, and when he was ready to go home. 
Pool accompanied him to the stable for his horse. As they 
walked along he offered Pool fifteen dollars a month for 
three months if he would help plow. The offer was ac- 
cepted. The usual wages were eight dollars a month, and to 
be offered fifteen was such an inducement that Pool had no 
hesitation in accepting it. He worked for Mr. See the full 
time, the three months, and received his forty-five dollars. 
This was the largest sum of mone}', entirely his own, that 
he had ever had. 

Mr. See having no further work for liira. Pool at once 
went to the B. & O. R. R., then building through the coun- 
try, and took a contract of clearing the wa}^ of timber for a 
certain distance. At this he made mone}', as he always did, 
and could, without doubt, have remained a contractor on 
the road until the last rail was laid, had he chosen to do so. 
But rumors of gold from California began to find their Avay 
into the mountains and vallej^s of West Virginia ; and, 
among the adventurous and ambitioTis soids that it fired 
with a determination to try the realities of the stories, there 
was none among all the youthful mountaineers more en- 
thusiastic than Pool Minear. His friend, E. Harper, was 



TEAYELEES. 279 

already gone, aud at that time was daring tlie dangers of tlie 
western plains, determined to be among the first upon 
the golden shore. The next from Tucker Avas to be Pool 
Minear. He might have been the first or with the first, had 
he possessed the financial means of going when young 
Harper went. But, if he could not accompany his friend, 
he was resolved to be there as soon as possible. 

Having finished his contract on the railroad, ho retiirned 
home, and announced that he was going to California. 
"Where is California?" his father asked in amazement, as 
though the name of a new world had been spoken. Pool 
acknowledged that he himself had onl}^ vague ideas v\'here 
the m^^sterious realm was situated ; but others had gone 
there, and he was certain that he could find it. It was in 
the West, and might be reached either by land or water. 
This was the substance of all he knew concerning it. For, 
be it remembered, that the science of Geography, in this 
part of West Virginia, was then known or partly knov/n 
onl}^ to a privileged few. 

But the uncertainty concerning the latitude and longitude 
of California was no obstacle in the way of getting there ; 
and Enoch Minear even encouraged his boy to go, and gave 
him three hundred dollars to help bear his expenses on the 
way. This was December 23, 1849. Four days later, young 
Minear left his home for the far West. It was in the dead 
of winter, and the snow was more than a foot deep. The 
nearest railroad station was Cumberland, in MarAdand, some 
seventy miles distant. Solomon Minear, his brother, accom- 
panied him on horseback to the Eed House, on the North- 
western turnpike, some twenty miles from St. George, and 
there set him down in fifteen inches of snow to malce his 
way to California as best he could, and there left him. 



280 HISTOIIY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

He had a letter of introduction from Senator Ewiu to 
Mrs, Wainriglit, of New York, a sister of Mr. Ewin. This 
was all he carried with him to recommend him to anybody 
in the great world of strangers into which he was burying 
himself. The undertaking before him seemed a great one, 
and it Avas a great one to a young man whose life had been 
spent almost entirely in the narrow limits of Tucker Countj'. 
California, the bourne and the goal of his ambition, was a 
vague realm, of which he possessed only the merest 
knowledge, and to him it seemed only as an ideal land be- 
jond the ocean. He was leaving all he knew behind him, 
and was launching boldly, if not blindly, out upon the great 
ocean of the Avonderful and the unknown. 

"With these and similar thoughts crowding thickly upon 
him, he stood in the snow on that winter day, and watched 
his brother, mIio had turned back, until, hidden by the fly- 
ing snow and the roughness of the country, the horse, 
rider and all passed from sight, and Pool was left entii-ely 
alone. The next time he saAv his brother Avas in California. 

"When the last gray outline of his brother's overcoat was 
lost from sight in the distance, A. P. Minear turned to the 
east, and Avith his small portmanteau slung across his shoul- 
der, he plodded ouAvard sloAvly through the snoAv. His 
journey lay across the Backbone and the Alleghany moun- 
tains, through a region fair and beautiful in the greenness 
of Slimmer, Avlien all nature from the loAvest forms to the 
highest are thrilled Avith passion and life ; but, a region 
drear and bleak Avhen the fierceness of Avinter is upon it, 
and the Avild storms of sleet and ice and snoAV are neA^er 
weary. SloAvly and Avith labor the young man climbed the 
slope of the Backbone, and at last stood upon its desolate 
summit. To the north Avard and AvestAvard the country of 



TRAVELEKS. 281 

the "Glades'' was in view ; and as the whole frigid pano- 
rama burst upon his vision, and the white, snowy fields were 
interspersed with darker expanses of forest, and away in 
the distance the winding, tortuous course of the Yough- 
iogheny could be traced along the ancient lake beds, whose 
water it had carried off in past ages, he felt that the under- 
taking was to him a momentous one. The land looked lone 
and desolate ; but, he could still see beauties in it, and 
then felt that it was his home. 

But he was too impatient to remain long in contemplation 
of the winter scenery, and in the reverie that the picture 
drew upon him. That dim, but not phantasmal land of gold 
and romance was so vividly painted in his mind that the 
brightness of its colors soon surpassed and blotted out 
those of the white hills and mountains far beneath him ; 
and with but one thing before his fancy, and that the Golden 
Shore beyond the sea, he turned, perhaps forever, from the 
scene at his feet, and with his portmanteau on his back, he 
pushed forward along the forest-lane that marks the line of 
the road across the mountain, and soon began the descent 
into the rugged valley of the North Branch of the Potomac. 

The country was only thinly inhabited. Here and there 
was the cabin of a mountaineer, who was willing to live 
apart from the rest of mankind in order to enjoy the luxur- 
ies of a forest life. Soon Minear turned down from the 
high plateau of the Backbone, and the snow grew less deep 
and he walked easier. Where Fort Pendleton now stands 
in ruins, was then only a field and a forest ; and as he passed 
wearily by, on the steep descent of the way, he had noth- 
ing to remind him what scenes of history would sometime 
be enacted about that very hill. The surrounding silence 
gave no token that in after years the tramp of troops, the 



282 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

trundling of train-wagons and the deep roar of ordnance 
would shake the xevj rocks over which he walked. Nor, 
when he reached the roaring river, which washed the mount- 
ain's feet, and plunges and raves and dashes eternally, did 
he once think how, in time to come, the ponderous iron horse 
would thunder through the mountains at fort}- miles an hour 
and that a city might sometime spring up where was then 
only a rough bridge and a dilapidated tavern. 

But, if such thoughts came not to him in the whisper of 
prophecy, there was still enough to occup}^ his mind. He 
crossed the river, and the next day crossed the Alleghanies, 
passed over the little river, Difficult, a stream of legends 
and myths, and crossed the rough ravine, called Stony River. 
At Mount Storm he was on the summit of the great Alle- 
ghanies. The name is suggestive of the character; for 
Mount Storm was a stormy mountain, where the wind 
knows no rest or mercy ; and the tornadoes are forever raging 
around the bald dome which marks the highest point. 

From there the road led doAvn toward the lower valleys ; 
and by evening Minear was so far on the plains below that 
he could look back and upward and see the mountains at 
intervals, and at intervals they were hidden in the thick 
masses of clouds, which are nearly ahvays hovering there. 

The young man had now placed between himself and his 
home one range of hills, one sierra of snowy summits, and 
he felt, at one time, that he had gained a victor}^ and at 
another that he was that much nearer his doom. But it 
was no time to think of either. He was going, and nothing 
could or should discourage or dissuade him. The excessive 
labor of walking through so much deep snow began to have 
an effect on his body but none at all upon his mind. His 
limbs were tired ; but his will to triumph, his determination 



TEAVELEES. 283 

to pnsli on, over and tlirougli and around obstacles and dif- 
ficulties, was not diminished, and down, down still nearer to 
the valley he took his way, and his mind that dwelt on am- 
bition and pictured the future knew no weariness. At Cum- 
berland the most arduous part of his journey would be at 
an end, and to that was due the fact that he would not stop 
on his way until that town was reached. 

From Cumberland to New York it was only a trip by rail, 
and possessed nothing of especial interest. Minear reached 
New York and Avas kindly received by the family to whom 
he was presented by his letter of introduction. Mr. Wain- 
right had a son and daughter about Minear's age, and as he 
expressed it in a letter written afterward : 

I remained there a week and had a splendid time witli these 
young people, who took nie, one by each wing-, and showed nie the 
strange New York sights. 

New York was the first vivid impression of the vastness 
of the w^orld and its human inhabitants that he had ever 
received. But it was not the end of his journey, it was 
really only the beginning of it, and from there his w^ay 
would lead through lands and seas still stranger than any 
he had yet seen. 

He remained in the metropolis one week and then took 
passage on the steamship Em/pire City for the Isthmus of 
Panama. That was the principal and the most usual route 
to California at that time. The other routes were across 
Central America at the San Juan del Sur, and by Elizabeth 
Bay, or around the southern extremity of South America, 
at Cape Horn, the route taken by some who went from 
Tucker, and by which the distance to California was more 
than half the distance around the world. The other com- 
mon road was the emigrant trail across the plains. Capt. 



284 HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

Harper took this route when he went in 1848 and 1849. 

At that time there was not, as there now is, a raih'oad 
across the Isthmus. Passengers got themselves across in 
any and every possible manner. The climate was hot and 
unhealthful, and those who remained on the Isthmus any 
length of time did so at the peril of their lives. However, 
many were obliged to stay for weeks, and sometimes for 
months, waiting on the western side for a vessel to carry 
them to San Francisco. 

When Minear reached there, he found only the rudest 
conveyances to carry him and the rest of the passengers to 
the other side. A portion of the journey was in canoes, 
manned by natives, dressed in linen as white as snow. It 
was hot, and when the canoes were fully under way, the 
natives threw aside their costume, and for the rest of the 
w^ay were clad after the manner of Adam and Eve while 
innocent in the Garden of Eden. The remonstrances of 
the passengers were utterly unavailing in causing them to 
dress themselves, and so they proceeded in that manner, 
although some of the passengers were ladies. 

The natural scenery along the way was tropical, and con- 
tinually called forth words of admiration from the passen- 
gers. They stopped at times and bought fruit and drank 
native coflfee, and after a series of adventures, their desti- 
nation was reached. In a letter Minear speaks thus of one 
of the native taverns : 

At one of these little native huts, we got splendid coffee and, as 
usual, cream or milk in it, which was quite a treat and helped 
wash down the crackers and cheese. At this particular place I 
now mention, I had drank one cup of coffee and called for another. 
As the lady took my cup and went into the adjoining hut to get 
the coffee, I stepped into the doorway, or open space, to take a 
look into the other room, when I saw her with my cup of coffee in 



TEAVELERS. 285 

one hand, streaming the cream or milk from her breast into it with, 
the other. Just then I had finished lunch and did not care for any- 
more coffee. 

He readied Panama on January 18, 1850 ; and the very- 
next day commenced looking about for sometliing to do. 
There was no prospect of getting to go to California any 
time soon, and it was his purpose to save all the money he 
could. It was a hard place to get work, and the best offer 
he could find was that of one dollar a day in a pancake 
bakery. This was better than nothing, and he accepted the 
offer and went to work. But he was only waiting for an 
opportunity to fall in with something better. 

A few days later he thought he saw a chance for specula- 
tion, and at once entered into it. Twelve miles from Pan- 
ama was Taboga, where the steamers took in coal and water. 
He saw money in running a boat from Panama to that place 
to carry the passengers who would want to go. Accord- 
ingly, he bought a whale boat for eighty dollars, and soon 
got a load of passengers. He had a "fair wind and made a 
splendid run ;""" and his passengers were safely landed at 
their destination. About sunset he left Taboga in his boat, 
accompanied by his two seamen, and started back to Pan- 
ama. But the winds were contrary ; and the boat was 
driven hither and thither all night, and not till the next day 
did it reach Panama. Minear was sea-sick, and entirely 
disgusted with his speculation. As soon as the boat touched 
the shore, he leaped out, started for the town, yelled back 
to his men that they could have the boat, and he never 
looked back. 

There Avas still no show of getting a passage to California, 
and he commenced looking about for something else to make 

"LPtter from San Fram.-lsco. 



28(5 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

money at. He rented a large room at two dollars a day, 
and charged ten cents a night to each person who spread 
his blanket and slept there. He made some money at this, 
and thought himself more fortunate than those who were on 
continual expense and were making nothing. 

As soon as he got a little better acquainted, he saw an- 
other opening for speculation in passenger tickets, and he 
entered into that business and made some money at it. 

He had now been on the Isthmus more than a month, and 
his impatience to get away may be imagined. Fortimately 
for him, it was in the winter time ; for had it been in the hot 
season of the year, the Avhole collection of passengers must 
have fallen by fever. The first of March came, and they 
were still there and no show of getting aAvay. Some wished 
they had stayed in New York, others that they had crossed 
the plains, and still others that they had the opportunity of 
going back home. But during all this, Minear was making 
the best of the situation and was looking sharpl}' about to 
take in all tlie loose money that was floating around among 
the reckless of the passengers. In this he was successful, 
and made more than enough to balance what he had lost in 
his whale-boat transaction. 

Early in March, 1850, the steamer Paiumui. came into 
port, and the passengers were jubilant at the prospect of 
getting to leave that fever-plagued coast. On March 5, they 
departed for San Francisco, and had a stormy voyage of 
twenty-four days before they approached the Golden Gate. 

As they were coming up the coast, Minear made the ac- 
quaintance of B. R. Buckelew, Esq., who had gone to Cali- 
fornia in 184(), biit had been east A^ ith liis famil}' and was 
just returning with his brother Scott. The acquaintance 
was a fortunate one for Mint-ar, who was totalh' unac- 



TEAYELERS. 287 

quaintecl witli any one in California, except Capt. E. Har- 
per, and lie knew not wliere, in all that wild country, to find 
Mm. Mr. Bnckelew soon found that young Minear had 
nothing definite laid out to do, and accordingly offered to 
furnish him a shed to sleep in until he could find something 
better. Pool felt grateful and accepted the ofter ; but he 
couldn't help thinking that in West Virginia a stranger would 
not have been offered a shed to sleep in. But he was 
learning the ways of the new world, and he had no hesi- 
tanc}' in accepting the shelter of a shed. 

They landed, and Minear was shown the shanty ; and, af- 
ter looking about for an hour or two, and as night came on, 
lie lay down upon the floor to sleep. He was not in imme- 
diate need of anything, and had over two hundred dollars in 
money. His only companion was an Irish boy, and with 
this company he lay down to sleep his first sleep in California. 

That night he was taken sick, and in the morning he sent 
for a doctor. He grew no better, and the doctor visited 
him regularly for two weeks, and finally got him on his feet. 
The doctor's bill Avas four hundred and fifty dollars. Pool 
had not money enough to pay it. Mr. Buckeiew's brother 
furnished the necessary money, and the doctor's unreasona- 
ble bill was paid off.'"' 

As soon as Minear felt able to work, he offered his ser- 
Aices to Mr. Buckelew, but Avas advised not to attempt 
work until he felt stronger. According] v, he laid off' a few 



* It may not he amiss to note that Captain Harper was some distance from San 
Francisco, ivlien lie heard that Jllnear had arrived and was sick. Harper's huslness 
Avas such that he could not get away to visit his young- friend ; hut he did not neglect 
liim. On a hank in San Francisco where he had money deposited, he gave Minear 
nu order to draw all he Avanted. But Mr. Buckelew's generosity had already rendered 
this unnecessary. This Incident is mentioned to show the friendship that then exist- 
ed between tliese two young AVest Virginians, in the strange country, 'i'lie kindly 
tef^llngs and conhdence hetweeen them never grew less, and In their subsequent 
Iji'sUiess transactions each would trust the other rurther than he would trust himscll". 



288 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

clays longer. Biit lie felt that lie must be doing sometliing, 
and again went to Buckelew for a job. Tliis time lie was 
more successful. He was shown a ponderous pile of bricks 
that it was necessary to move about two hundred yards. 
Pool did this with a wheelbarrow. Mr. Buckelew was so 
pleased with the perseverance and pluck of the young man 
that he invited him to his own house and kept him there as 
long as he had anything to be done. Mr. Buckelew had 
several city lots which needed leveling, and Minear was 
given the contract. He soon had fifty men at work, and 
kept at it until every lot was leveled, and his employer had 
nothing else for him to do. This was April 15, 1851. In 
their settlement, Minear was paid two hundred and fifty 
dollars a month, and was charged with no lost time, 

Minear now turned his attention to the lumber business, 
which in California is usually a paying one. There is money 
in it to all who are fortunate ; but, it is risky for those who 
are not used to the business. Minear bought two ox-teams, 
and went to hauling logs for the mill. He was successful 
at every turn. Every stream "was bubbling over with 
luck," and he made money fast. Soon another mill nearby 
offered him greater inducements, and he went to work for 
it, and was still as successful as ever. He remained with 
the new firm that bought the old one out, until in the fall of 
1853. But, in the meantime he built a new mill for the 
same company. They were gradually placing in liis hands 
the whole business, and he was not liackward in cvecopt- 
ing it. 

In the fall of 1853 ho accepted the position of manager in 
general for a large lumljer establislimout and had tlic entire 
control of the business. He was })aid twenty tlionsaiid dol- 
lars a mouth. He was now on the road to fcnlune, and was 



TEAVELEKS. 289 

doing well in every particular. But, in April, 18o4, liis 
monthly payment was not made. This did not make 
much difference, and he continued the business, paying ex- 
penses from his own pocket. The next payment was not 
made, and he began to inquire into the cause of it, but 
still kept the business going. But, in the midst of his 
investigations the company broke. One of the partners leffe 
for Mexico, one died and the third had no mone3^ Minear 
paid \\\) the indebtedness of the mills and had nothing left. 
He spent forty thousand dollars of his own money in set- 
tling with small contractors and laborers. He considered 
that he could afford to lose all he had easier than so many 
could give up tlieir all ; and so he paid that whicli, by law, 
he need not have paid. But, it In'oke him up, financially, 
l)ut not physically or mentally. 

Before this financial failure, Minear had sent to Iowa for 
his brother-in-law, Henry M. Stemple, and famil}^ and they 
crossed the plains to join him. He had bought them a 
home ; but, before they got to it, the crash came, and Mi- 
near left California on horseback and went to Oregon. 
But Stemple reached the farm, and lived and died on it, 
and his wife, formerly Eliza Minear, still lives on the pro]?- 
erty, some miles north of San Francisco, in a beautiful and 
fertile country. 

At Eainier, Oregon, A. P. Minear met his old friend, 
Capt. E. Harper, who was then carrying on an extensive 
mercantile business there. As Minear was out of employ- 
ment, and had not an extra supply of money, he was glad 
of the presented offer of going into partnership with Mr 
Harper. For a vrliile after this, they conducted the busi- 
ness together, and when Harper went to California, Minear 
continued the trade. 



'2'JO HI8T0EY OF TUCKEE COUNTY. 

About this time Miiiear made the acquaintance of Miss 
Lucretia Mood}-, a young lad}- from New York, who, with 
her father's family, and other friends, had crossed the 
jilaius to the Pacific coast. They were soon afterward 
married ;""' and they contin\iod the stores at Rainier until 
some time in 1850, when the business was brought to a 
close. 

AYith his wife he now retivrned to California, and lived 
that year Avitli Stemple, his brother-in-law ; but did not en- 
gage deeply in business. Some of the affairs in Oregon 
needed looking after, and he returned for that pur- 
pose. In order to close up the concerns there, he found it 
necessary to buy and sell to a considerable extent. "While 
doing this, he found that he Avas making money, and he saw 
no reason why he might not continue it. He decided to do 
so, and Avent to California for his wife. In Oregon they 
carried on a large store and hotel. Mrs. Minear assumed 
management of the latter, and Mr. Minear of the former. 
Things went on well, and they made money at every turn of 
the Avheel of fortune. This was in 1857. 

In 1858, a Mr. Warren, who owned a saw-mill at that 
place was desirous of visiting his family at Boston, and 
Avished Minear to look after his lumber interests. This 
Minear agreed to do, and added two or three thousand dol- 
lars Avorth of improvements to the mill. But, before the 
return of Mr. AYarren, the mill burnt doAvn. When Warren 
got back, he offered Minear the burnt machinery as pay for 
the service done, and as return for the money invested in 
ini]n-ovements. This Avas rather poor pay ; but it Avas that 
much better than nothing, and Minear accepted it. He 
at once set about rebuilding it, using such of the ma- 



February 28, 1850. 



TIIAYELEKS. 291 

cliinerj as was available, and replacing the woitliless -with 
new. 

To rebuild tlie mill cost him eight thousand dollars. He 
got it ready to start at six p. ni., and made arrangements to 
commence work at six next morning, and had men employed 
to run it night and day. At four in the morning it burnt 
down. He rebuilt it at the same cost, run it six days, and 
it again burnt down. 

These reverses would have bankrupted him, had he not 
been making large sums of money in the other departments 
of his business. He built the mill the third time ; but, the 
price of lumber had fallen until a small mill would not pay. 
Meanwhile, he was furnishing money and supplies to a man 
named Fox, who was building a water mill just back of the 
town of Bainier, for the purpose of sawing cedar lumber. 
By the time his mill Avas fairly started, he owed Minear near 
seven thousand dollars, and, feeling dubious about being 
able to make that much out of the mill, he offered to give it, 
lumber and all, to him, in satisfaction of the debt. Minear 
accepted the offer. Fox made him a deed for it, and the 
whole matter Avas settled and the mill, property and all, 
were in Minear's hands. He was yet standing at his desk, 
having just signed his part of the contract when the sawyer 
came running in and exclaimed: "Mr. Fox, vour mill is ou 
fire."'"' It burnt down, and Avas the third mill so to bt^ 
destroyed on Minear's hands. He noAV thought it time to 
get out of the mill business, and sold his steam mill, that hy 
had rebuilt the third time, for one thousand dollars, and 
never got a cent of the money. 

Although uniformly unsuccessful in the mill business, 
yet with his hotel and store he made money very fast. His 

' From a let tor written II rtenvu I'd. 



29-2 HISTOEY OF TUCKER COUyTT. 

great trade was with the Columbia River bottom-land far- 
mers, who bought their goods one rear and paid for them 
the next, when their crops came into market. This was all 
working beautifullv until 1862, when a great flood came 
down the Columbia, higher than it has ever been known 
since or was ever known before. It drowned out the far- 
mers. Many were left destitute, had nothing to pay debts 
or buy bread. The land, which before the flood was valua- 
ble, was now worthless. 

The depreciation in the value of property left us about, on a 
level with the rest of the j)eople. Our hotel and store -were worth- 
less. I paid oar debts and had very little left." 

^Meanwhile, among the people of Tucker there was still a 
remnant of the California excitement. The Minears seemed 
to be the readiest to go. Jacob, Thaddeus and Jerome 
Harper had followed their brother, Captain Harper, to Cal- 
ifornia, and before this time, were scattered along the 
Pacific coast from Chili, in South America, to British Co- 
lumbia. From the time Pool Minear went, tmtil lSo9, ten 
years, several persons had gone from Tucker County to try 
their forbines in the Golden State. "William and George 
Minear had gone west. George settled at Killboume. 
Iowa, and still resides there, William lives at Oakland, 
California, just across the Bay from San Francisco. 

In the summer of 18-59, quite a nimiber of young people 
in and about St. George determined to go to Cahfomia. 
Among them were A. T. Bonuifield and family, and John 
"W. Mineai-, In November of that year they left "West 
Tirginia and repaired to New York, where they took the 
steamer for Panama, The journey to New York contained 
nothing of particular interest, and the stay in the city was 

•Letters. 



TEA^TLEES. 293 

of import only to those who enjoyed it and took in the 
many strange sights that a great city contained. 

They secni'ed passage on a fine steamer for Panama, and 
with ererything propitious they swept from the harbor out 
upon the stormy Atlantic. The novelty of the new Hfe, the 
change of scenery, the sea-sickness and the absence of 
everything terrestrial, kept the passengers from growing 
melancholy with the monotony of the surroundings. In 
fair weather, they stood on deck ; but when it was stormy, 
they remained in the cabins, or down below. TThile pass- 
ing the mouth of the Gulf of Cahfomia, an incident took 
place, which has never been forgotten by those interested. 
They were all below ; for. in passing the Gulf, Cape San 
Lucas as the point is called, the wind blows a gale toward 
the land, and passes up the gulf to the hot region about the 
mouth of the Colorado Eiver. John Minear was below 
with the rest ; and, desiring to go on deck, and not seeing 
his own hat at hand, he picked up Bonnifield's hat, and 
proceeded to the deck. The moment he protruded his head 
above the timbers of the ship, the wind swept away his hat 
like a cannon ball, and it passed out to sea, and its fate is 
unknown to this day. It was a small affair, but it cast a 
gloom over both Minear and Bonnifield, the former because 
he had lost it, and the latter because it was lost. Bonni- 
field never forgot that hat ; and he often wondei^s whether 
it was eaten by a shark, or whether, like Jonah, it was swal- 
lowed by a whale, or whether it became water -logged and 
sank into the fathomless caverns of the sea, or whether the 
winds and waves lashed and dashed it until it was beaten to 
pieces, and the dissevered fragments were scattered and 
strewn upon the rocky coasts of islands, continents, penin- 
sulas, isthmuses and capes. In all probability its fate will 



I 



294 HISTOEY OF TI^CKER COUNTY. 

never be known ; bnt it lias never been forgotten by Bonni- 
lield who had to go into })ort and step npon the Golden 
Sliore bare-lieaded. 

When they reached San Francisco, Minear went to his 
sister, Mrs. fStcniple's. As soon as he had rested a little, he 
])egan looking- about for a way to make his fortune. He had 
nothing in particular laid out to do and, in consequence, 
commenced looking about over the country for an opening. 
He rather preferred farming, and had no difficulty in find- 
ing a piece of land vrhicli suited him. It was about eighty 
miles northward from San Francisco, in the heart of a 
country of which he thus speaks in one of his letters : 

The whole country is as one flower garden, as far as can be seen. 
The low, rolling hills and the level plains between are so thickly- 
covered with bloom of every imaginable color and dye, that the 
brightness dazzles the eye, and one luust turn away before he can 
fully realize how splendid and magnificent the scenery really is. 
tSo rich in perfume are the flowers that if one Avalks through them 
his clothes will retain the odor for hours thereafter, and even for 
days : 

He was only looking at the country, and lie next visited 
some of the Avatering places and fashionable resorts of Cal- 
ifornia. But he saw nothing there worth taking hold of 
from which to make money. He then went into the mount- 
ains, and explored some of the timbered regions, of which 
he thus speaks : 

Trees ten and fifteen feet across the stump are nothing unusual, 
and are so often seen that they attract no attention. They are 
usually from one hundred and fifty to three hundred feet high ; 
and sometimes are nearly two hunch-ed feet to the limbs. 

Thus, by moving about from place to place, but doing 
\evy little work, he spent the year, and came out of it with 
less money than he had at the beginning. 

He Avas now ]n-etty well satisfied that he liad seen all of 



TRAVELERS. 295 

California tliat it was to his interest to see, and lie began to 
contemplate joining his brother Pool in Oregon. Accorcl- 
ingl}^ he took steamer for Portland, and arrived there in 
due time. He found the land along the Columbia mostly 
new country, partly timbered and partly not. Business 
seemed more brisk than it had been in California. At 
least, it was more to his liking. He selected the lumber as 
the best business at that particular time, and accordingly 
devoted himself to the pursuit of it. ■ Cedar was from sixty 
to eighty dollars per thousand feet, square measure, and at 
this he thought himself able soon to make a fortune and 
return home rich. The trees were eight or ten feet in diam- 
ter, and were nsually cut that high from the ground, by 
building a scaffold, or adjusting a board in a notch cut into 
the tree. At this work he remained two 3'ears ; but, not 
getting rich as rapidl}' as he thought he ought to, he quit it, 
passed on a steamer two hundred miles up the Columbia 
and landed in Washington Territory, where he again en- 
gaged in the lumber trade, but this time in cord-wood. 

Meantime, in 1860 and ISGl, the Avar came on in the east, 
and Tucker County was between two fires. The Confeder- 
ates held the mountains south of the county, and along the 
railroad north of the county were large numbers of Union 
troops. Raids v/ere frequent into Tucker, and many per- 
sons felt unsafe. Among those Avere Enoch Minear and A. 
C. Minear. They Avere strong sujiporters of the Union 
cause, and tlie}^ imagined that they Avere in danger. They 
thought it best, or at least, well enough, to remove a little 
from the seat of Avar. Accordingly, they Avent to Calii'oinia. 

Adam C. Minear Avas born at St. George, October 0, 1845. 
St. George Avas at that time called Westernford. A. C. Avas 
the youngest of a family of ten ; and, being young Avas no 



29G HISTOPiY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

doubt all that i^revented liis going wlien bis brothers went. 
He was j^oung, onl}' seventeen ; but he felt able to meet the 
world and battle it for all it was Avortli, and risk his fortune 
on the issue. 

He took passage from New York to the Isthmus of Pan- 
ama on a splendid ocean steamer. He seemed to enjoy his 
time, and found something each day to interest him ; for, as 
he said in one of his letters : 

The ciy of "whale" froii'i Hoiiie huiatic would seldom fail to bring 
on deck every passenger able to leave his state room ; and the silly 
duiK-es would stand with eyes strained and mouths open in their 
heroic efforts to discern the whale's stupendous carcass heave 
above the waters. Of course, nine times out of ten, or nineteen 
times out of twenty, there Avas no whale to be seen. In fact, I 
never got to see one at all. But it seemed that the passengers 
could leai-n nothing by experience. They were always ready to 
rush upon deck, and be made the fools of some bigger fool. Some 
of the aristocracy, who have more imagination than brains, looked 
through their long spy-glasses, any declared that they could see 
whales by the thousand ; but I noticed that they could see just as 
many whales with their glasses pointed toward the sky as when in 
any other quarter. 

********* 

Tliere Avere on the ship, as 1 suppose there are on all ships, per- 
sons V ho had often before been over the same route, and whose 
knov/ledge of it enabled them to point out something of interest 
or some historical locality almost every hour of the day. If a cape 
came in view, they knew something about it, by whom it was dis- 
covered, or who was buried there ; or they could relate some geo- 
graphical fact connected v.-ith it. 

I'oung Minear w;is getting his eyes openetl to the world, 
and the rango of his knoAvledge was growing wider. He 
was !i, good scholar for his age and chance. His education 
Lad been acquired in the old school-house, of the school of 
1850, that stood on the bank of the mill race, which was 



TKAYELEKS. 297 

dug bv John Minear in 1776. A. C. had gotten to be a 
good scholar, and, although young, he was prepared to 
travel. The value of travel to him, and the interest which 
he took in seeing that of which he had only read before, 
and had known only as it existed in school geographies, 
ma}' be judged from the following extract from one of his 
letters : 

When I passed those islands, and saw the capes and promonto- 
ries rise above the sea, my mind went back to the school room, and 
I remembered and pitied tlie dumb boys wlio used to stand sneak- 
ing before the teaclier, because tliey could not tell exactly whether 
Cuba was at Babylon or in Cape Hatteras. The i)oor scoundrels 
could not tell ; for, I have been there, and know by experience how 
hard it is to remember things that are only things. I thought that 
I pretty Avell understood the general character of land and Avater; 
but I find that I am dumber than most people take me to be. Is- 
lands are larger, and oceans bigger, and storms stronger and 
uiountains rougher than one can get any idea of by reading books. 
In our debating 'Rinkle' Ave used to discuss Avhich Avould teach a 
man the more, reading or traveling. Some of us Avere ahvays 
ready to express opinions, and argue on one side or the other ; but 
none of us had eA-er traA'eled any, and had no means of knoAving 
what there is in the Avorld. For, if Ave Avere to read half the time 
for ten years, Ave could not learn Avhat I haA'e learned in coming 
from New York doAvn here.* 

A youth Avho thus traveled Avitli his eyes open, and Avho 
found leisure to see every island, inspect ever}- cape and 
promontory, and to despise the silly people, Avho, in the ex- 
citement of the moment, could turn their spy-glasses sky- 
ward and see whales, such a youth Avas getting benefit from 
Ms traveling. He has left recorded in letters and in his di- 
ary a journal of his proceedings southward over the Atlan- 
tic, through the West Indias, and across the Caribbean Sea» 

* Panama. 



298 HISTORY OF TUCKEll C^OUNTY 

Wlien he got to Aspinwall lie soon had made up his mind 
concerning it, as we can see from his journal : 

An hour's stroll through the streets of this ancient town is 
enough to convince the average emigrant that it is not the safest 
l)lace on the globe, although one has at his connnand all the 
niodei-n means of self defense. It looks to me like the den of rob 
V)ere and the habitation of wickedness in every shape. The people 
seem to be of different languages ; but as far as that is concerned, 
it is all Dutch to me. They nnist make their living by stealing or 
robbing ; for they don't appear to be workini^ a bit. They loaf 
around the corners of the roads, and wait for i>eople to come along 
to be robbed. At least it looks so to me. I can't see how Pool* 
stood it on this Isthnuis two or three months, while, if I have to 
stay here that many hours it is uiore than I have bargained for. 

When he had crossed the Isthmus, which was done on 

the cars and was a ride of forty miles, he was in Panama, of 

which place his opinion was soon made up and expressed : 

A person in search of civilization need not stop here very long. 
He will soon find out that he is "barking up the wrong stump,'' 
for it is worse here than at Aspinwall, and I am getting tired of 
the surroundings. If a ship don't soon come to take me to San 
Francisco, I will be tempted to make my way on foot through 
]Mesico. The weather is warm here, although so late in the fall. 

A ship did soon come from San Francisco to take the pas- 
sengers there, and no time was lost in getting aboard. The 
passage north'ward was the same old story of a sea voyage. 
Some things were getting their newness worn awa}'. The 
credulous travelers failed to see such multitudes of whales, 
and there was less excitement when a report of any kind 
actually did get started. In passing Cape San Lucas, as is 
always the case, there was a strong wind, and the sea became 
boisterous. Many became sea sick, but the Cape was passed 
and all became quiet again. The next thing of note was 



' A. p. Wlnear, brother to A. O. Mlnear. 



TRAVELEES. 290 

the arrival at San Francisco. From a letter of A. C- 
Minear's the following is taken : 

At last the Golden Gate appeared. A sigh of relief went up from 
every passenger on board. I could not, in my own gladness, re- 
frain from thinking how many thousands of sea sick mortals have 
hail&d Avith joy thi.s same harbor, this same Golden Gate ; and how 
many have looked back over the long way of waters, the ocean of 
storms and the domain of desert seas, and then cast their eyes for- 
ward to the solid shore, where rest would be found at last, and 
where sea sickness would not be dreaded. The scenery was beau- 
tiful, although we were only approaching the shore. Except the 
solitary peaks of a mountain here and there along the coast to the 
southward, this was my first sight of Califoj-nia. I was eager to 
see it, and leaned against the gunwales to steady myself that I 
might the better scan the shore. 

As we drew nearer," I noticed that the mountains were not as 
heavily timbered as they are in [West] Virginia. 

I have never read much of the past of California, and less still of 

this harbor. I know only a little of what has taken place here. 

But I felt an interest in the things about me ; for I felt that it was 

romantic ground, and that it Avas intermixed with strange stories. 

s . * * « » '» « * * * 

As soon as I got on shore, and had taken a hasty survey of San 
Francisco, I began to feel more at home. But I find that it is hard 
to get acquainted with San Francisco. The people are of every 
nation and of every tongue. 

As soon as A. C. Minear bad looked for a few days about 
the country, and had visited his relatives in California, he 
set out for Oregon, Avhere his two brothers, Pool and John, 
then were. 

Solomon Minear had been killed by a horse after his arri- 
val in California. George Minear went to that State, but 
returned to Iowa. William lived and still lives in Oakland, 
California. Miss Catharine Minear, a daughter of Enoch 
Minear, and a sister of A. C, had gone to California with 



300 HISTOBY OF TUCKEK COUNTY. 

lier fatlier, and liad married C. W. Moore, of Idaho, and 
still resides in Boise City, in tliat Territorj-. 

A. C. Miuear passed through Oregon and Washington 
Territory, stopping occasionally on the yvay, and early in 
1864 reached Silver City, Owyhee County, Idaho. The 
mines had 0UI3' recently been discovered, and the first who 
had attempted to work thejn had been driven out with loss 
by the Indians. 

Meanwhile, John Minear had grown tired of the lumber 
business, and had gone two hundred miles up the Columbia, 
into Washington Territory, where he took a contract to fur- 
nish two thousand cords of wood at ten dollars a cord. 
He strung out seven yoke of cattle to a wagon and hauled 
seven cords of wood at a load. He made money at this ; 
and just as he was finishing his contract, came the rumors 
of the mines in Idaho, to which A. C. Minear and A. P. 
Minear, his brothers, were already on the wa}'. 

Teams with which to haul goods to the mines were in 
great demand. John Minear put one hundred head of cat- 
tle on the road, hitched them to ponderous wagons loaded 
with freight, and started for Idaho, five hundred miles awaj'. 
Merchants paid fifty cents a pound for hauling their goods 
into the country, and at these figures, som,ething ought to 
be made by a man with fifty yoke of cattle. He had with 
him a quartz mill, owned by his brother, A. P. Minear, and 
was taking it to Idaho, at a cost of sixty thousand dollars. 
In September, 1864, Avith his ox-teams, John Minear reached 
Silver City. 

After the flood of 1862 swept away A. P. Minear's fortune 
at Rainier, he commenced looking about for something else 
to do. He took seven yoke of oxen and started up the 
river. He had an idea of engaging in the cord- wood busi- 



TEAVELEKS. 301 

ness ; but it was not his definite purpose to do so. He 
told his wife that he would be gone six months, and punctu- 
ally to the very day he returned. He had engaged in haul- 
ing cord-wood for the Oregon S. N. Co., and had cleared ten 
thousand dollars. With this he bought several large teams 
of oxen and heavy wagons. When his contract was done, 
he returned home ; but he left another contract for one 
thousand cords unfinished. In 1863 he returned to complete 
the contract. The steamboats got into a war with each 
other, and the overseer of the wood works asked Minear if 
he would not as lief wait till the next year before finishing 
the contract. 

This was just what Minear wanted. He had heard 
rumors of the new gold findings in Idaho, and he was de- 
sirous of visiting the country and seeing it for himself. He 
thought it well that he should get into some other business. 
Accordingly, he agreed to postpone the completion of his 
contract till the next year, and returned to Portland with 
twelve large ox-teams. He loaded his wagons with a large 
supply of jDrovisions for the men, and to sell when they 
should reach Idaho, It was a long procession, and may 
have looked like the moving of an army of Egyptian chariots. 

On November 3, 1863, in the midst of a terrific snow- 
storm, the teams arrived in Placerville, Idaho. The country 
was wild and almost uninhabited, and there was scarcely 
any feed for cattle to be had at all. What hay the Minears 
could get they paid two hundred and fifty dollars a ton for. 
The cattle were so crazy and fierce with hunger that it was 
dangerous to go near them. From a letter of A. P. Minear's 
the following is taken : 

On Friday I stored my goods in a large log house in the edge of 
town. Saturday I got iny cattle out to a place where it was pos- 



302 HISTOEY OF TUCKEE COUNTY. 

sible for them to get some little to eat. Sunday it began to be 
noised about the camps that there was a man in the edge of town 
who had goods to sell. They crowded into my house till they filled 
full eyery part not occupied by goods. They said that it was the 
custom to buy one Sunday and pay the next. They Avere all 
strangers to me ; but I told them if such was the custom, all right. 
That day I sold them on credit four thousand dollars worth of 
goods, and did not know a man. Thus it went till the next Sun- 
day, when they all paid, except forty-six dollars. I sold all my 
goods in this manner, and cleared nineteen thousand dollars on 
them. 

In the spring of 1864 lie returned to Oregon, finislied his 
vood contract, and was prepared to m^ke another expedi- 
tion to Idaho. He bought a quartz mill, loaded it on his 
wagons, was joined by J. W. Minear's wagon train, and they 
departed for the Idaho mines. They had their wagons 
loaded with tools, provisions, and everything that it was 
supposed they would need. 

He had no particular place designated to which to go, 
and when his teams were fairly on the road, he left them 
and went on ahead to select a site for the mill. He selected 
Silver City, Owyhee County, Idaho, as the best location ; 
and then returned, met his teams, and arrived with them in 
Silver City in July. He estimated tliat he was then worth 
thirtj-'five thousand dollars. He put from forty to fifty men 
to work erecting the mill, and on tlie 14th of Septemljcr 
that year, 1864, he turned out the first silver brick of Idaho. 
By the next spring he "was forty thousand in debt; or 
that much worse off than nothing." •'■ 

The following concerning this quartz mill is taken from a 
letter written by John W, Minear. The three brothers, A. 
P., J. AY. and A. C. Minear were all in Silver City at thnt 
time : 



From a letter of A. i". JUnear'.s. 



TEAYELERS. ?)03 

Then coiniueiiced the exciting: times of this district. The men 
v/ere all anxious to see the mill start and to get their ore worked. 
They would take their ore to the mill to get it crushed, just as we 
used to take our corn when I was a boy. Everybody was rich in 
mines, although not a dollar in pocket. The men often took from 
the mines from sixty to one hundred dollars worth of silver a day. 

When A. P. Minear left Rainier in 1863, his wife com- 
menced closing out the business, and sometime that sum- 
mer she joined him where he was delivering the cord-wood, 
and where he had built her a neat little cottage furnished 
nicely. 

"When her husband went into business in Idaho, she sold 
out again, bought a fine span of horses and a light wagon, 
and with her little traps, and three children in it, set out to 
join him. It was live hundred miles, and the road lav 
through a wild country, filled by bands of hostile Indians. 
She camped out at night, and finalh' reached her husband 
in safety. 

In the Avinter of 1864-5 provisions became scarce, as 
might be expected in a country untillcd, and so far from 
civilization, and where the great mass of the people had 
gone there with nothing but a shovel and pick. Nearly ev- 
ery one of the two or three thousand peo]3le then in camp 
got short of things to eat. Many were glad to get beans 
cooked "straight," as it was called, that is, without salt or 
seasoning. The following is from an account given by Mrs. 
Catherine Moore, a sister of the Mineavs, and then in Idaho : 

The snow buried our house so that I did not see daylight for three 
weeks, except when the snow was shoveled from the windows. We 
had flour ; but many of the people had not, and some had only 
l»eans, and some, for all I know, may not have had that much. 
Many lived on beans cooked in water, Avithout salt, and they weiv 
glad to get that. In one camp, a few miles from here, the men liad 
V,»een eating this kind of provisions for several weeks, and grew so 



304 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

tii-ed of it that they said that they would hunt souietliing else. So 
they left their camp, which was buried in the snow, and they could 
get out only by climbing up through the roof, and out at the top. 
Howev'er, they got out, and wandered off over the snow to hunt 
some place where flour was kept. But it was a fruitless search, and 
after strolling about for two or three days, getting lost and hungry 
and cold and discouraged, they came back to their camp, and were 
entirely willing to eat beans. 

Meanwhile, in the camp where the Minears were, rations 
were running fearfully short. From a letter of A. P. Mi- 
near's we learn something of the situation and of the coun- 
try at that season of the year : 

There Avas flour at the foot of the mountains, about twenty miles 
distant ; but it was worth almost a man's life to make the trip at 
that time, through the drifting snoAV and terrific wind storms. 
However, I offered to go, and I got twenty-four volunteers. It was 
only twenty miles to the store where the flour Avas kept ; and we 
thought that we could make it out in one day. But we learned 
our mistake. When night came on, we got into the edge of the 
timber, and by the merest accident found a little hut where six 
men were getting out boards. 

The hut was so small that the thirty-one of us could barely 
squeeze inside of it. There was no room to lie down or to sit, down; 
so we had to stand up. There we stood, tired as we were, all night; 
while outside the snoAV flew and the wind whistled and roared over 
the little cabin. The next morning twenty-five of us started for 
the store at the foot of the mountain. We walked hard all day 
through the ice and snowdrifts, and about dark reached the store, 
having made tvi^enty miles in two days. 

When tlie}^ reached the store, the owners refused to sell 
the flour, although Miuear offered them the money. They 
would not even set a price on it. It was their ]iurpose, no 
doubt, to hold on to it until the miners were reduced by 
liimger, and would give an enormous sum for it. Minear 
and his men offered them everything that was fair and right, 
but Avere flatly refused the flour. It was a case of necessity 



TEAVELEES. : 305 

with tliem, and tliey would have it. The letter goes on : 

Finally I told them and my men that Ave would have to take it. 
In less than half a minute every man had shouldered a sack and 
was upon the road home. We went back half mile or so, and stop- 
ped in a willow swamp. By hard work we kept our fire burning 
all night. We opened one sack of flour, dipped up water with our 
hands from a cow track in the swampy ground, and by that means 
we mixed up a little flour and watei*. We I'oasted the dough by 
wrapping it around a stick and holding it to the fire. This we kept 
up till morning, when we started, and that nighc reached the little 
cabin in the woods. It was nine or ten o'clock before all got in. 

I was so tired I could not stand up in that cabin all night : so I 
went out in a snow-pit, drew my coat over my head, and lay down. 
I was soon nicely covered with drifting snow, and slept soundly. 
The next morning it was very cold ; the snow was flying thick and 
fast, and the wind was blowing like fur}'. Many times we could 
not see twenty feet in any direction for the drifting snow 

Before leaving the hut, I had each man to split up some boards 
into small sticks, like your finger, and each man took a bundle of 
them. The plan was to stick one in the snow every few feet, so 
that, should we get lost, we could trace our way back to the cabin. 
This Avas a well-timed expedient ; for we had not been out of the 
timber half an hour until we were all lost in the storm. It was no 
use trying to go forward ; so the only thing that Avas left was for 
us to remain where we were or to trace our way back to the cabin. 
We decided to do the latter. It was no easy undertaking. The 
snow had covered some of the stakes which we had stuck in the 
snow, and some had been blown away by the wind. We had to 
kick around until Ave found them, and then leaA^e a man at the last 
until the next was found. By this means we got back to the hut 
in the timber, Avhere we took another stand for the night. 

The next day, the fifth of our journey, was clear and cold, and on 
that day all but two of us got home. That two became separated 
and lost and did not get in till the seventh day. 

We dealt out the flour by the tin cup full, one or two, dei)euding 
upon whether it was a family or a single man. 

A. C. Minear was then in this part of Idaho, and from a 

letter Avritten by him sometime after this soarcitv of pro- 
so 



306 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

visions, some new features may be seen in the camps. It 
shows to what extent the mining was carried on, and wliat 
wealth was often taken from the mines. The letter, after 
giving an account of the scarcit}' of provisions, Avhen flour 
was one dollar a pound, runs thus : 

The famous ' Poor Man's ' mine, in Owyhee produced nearly pure 
sliver. Pieces of ore weighing one thousand pounds were found to 
contain nine hundred pounds of silver. The ' Ida Elmore 'and 
'Golden Chariot" mines were the richest in gold bearing quartz. 
Bullion produced from them was worth from seven to ten dollars 
per ounce. 

In these two mines was the scene of one of the most i>eculiar 
battles ever fought in the world. The mines were near each other, 
and disputes naturally arose concerning the ground between them, 
"which, upon examination, was found to be the richest of all. in gold. 
A compromise was made, by which it was understood that neither 
"was to cross a certain line until the right of one or the other should 
be established by some legal process. 

But, this did not settle the quarrel. As the ore got richer, the 
two comjianies worked toward each other, and paid no attention 
to the compromise. In the course of time they came together six 
hundred feet under ground, and the battle began. At first, clubs, 
pieces of qiuirtz, picks, hammers, knives, pistols and gvms were 
used bj' the belligerants. But, breastworks were built, and ore 
was piled up for fortifications, and the two subterranean armies 
lay entrenched against each other. Then cannon Avere lowered 
into the shafts, and a terrific cannonade was connnenced. The re- 
sults were fearful. In the confined air of the mine the roar of the 
artillery surpassed anything ever heard on the surface of the earth. 
The pillars, cohnuns and braces were shot away, and fragments of 
flying quartz whistled through the dark caverns of the mines. The 
discharge of small guns could be heard only at intervals, between 
the discharges of the heavier ordnance. Much of the interior 
structure of the mines waa ruined, and this strange battle ended 
with no decisive results for either side. A troop of soldiers came 
up and by threatening to block up the mine, put an end to the 
unnatural tight. " 



TEAVELERS. 307 

Those who have visited Silver City, Idaho, will remember 
that it is on a small stream called Jordan Creek, w'hicli 
covers over with snow until it is not seen from fall till 
spring. In the spring, when the snow begins to melt, where 
exposed to the sun on the south hill sides, the creek rises, 
and carries away the snow that filled its channel all winter. 
Thus, the creek is open, while its high banks are covered 
with hard-packed snow. 

A. P. Minep,r lived beside this creek, about three-fourths 
of a mile above the town. He was engaged in mining specu- 
lations in 1868 ; and, in one of his trades, had incurred the 
hatrrd of some speculators, whom he had defeated in their 
plans. They, therefore, planned violence against him, and 
attempted to bring their plans into execution on the night 
of May 5, 1868. It was a most cowardly assault, and also 
one most wicked and brutal. The following is an account 
of it, taken from a letter of his, written after his recovery 
from injuries received : 

I left town at ten o'clock to go home, traveling along a trail 
through the snow. I met a man, spoke to hiin, we both said "good 
evening" and passed on. When we had gotten about fifty yards 
apart, he yelled like an Indian, and started to run after me. I 
knew that I could run to the house before he could catch me : so I 
was not the least alarmed. When I had run about twenty-five steps, 
and was within four hundred yards of my house, I ran over a small 
ridge, and found inyself in the midst of a gang of ten or twelve 
men, who lay flat on the snow. * 

Before I knew of their presence, they were all upon me. They 
did not strike me, only pressed me down into the snow by force. I 
was still on my feet ; but was down as though sitting on a stool 
four or five inches high and had my right hand extended out. By 
this time, the man whom I had met and who ran after me, had 
come up and had gotten in front of me with drawn pistol. By 
some means, he dropped his revolver, and it fell, handle first, into 
my right hand, just as you would hold it, if going to shoot. 



308 HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

I said, "men, in the name of Grod, what are you going to do with 
me ?" (well knowing that it meant death). When I said that, one 
of the men said, "smother him, so he can't halloo," another said, 
"choke him." At that, a man's left hand went round my throat. I 
caught with my left hand the barrel of the pistol that had dropped 
into my hand, and, cocking the weapon, fired at the man who stood 
in front of men. I intended to shoot him through the body, but 
only touched his thigh. 

At the crack of the pistol they let me go, struck me across the 
hea^ with something like a revolver, and commenced shooting at 
met. I attempted to rise to my feet and run for the creek, about 
forty yards distant down a steep hill ; but I could not stand. I 
fell on the snoAV ; but rolled and scrambled until I reached the 
creek bank. I shot at them three times on the way. I went over 
the bank, intending to crawl under the snow that covered the creek 
at that particular point. 

The bank of the creek, together with the snow, was as high as 
my head. I landed on my feet, and by the aid of the bank, I was 
able to stand. I laid my pistol on the bank, took deliberate aim at 
three of them, who were about ten feet from me, and fired. I shot 
one man in the arm, from which he died, and shot another who 
also died. I then let go the bank to hide under the snow and ice. 
But I fell over in the creek, v^'here the water was two or three feet 
deep. 

My pistol was Avet, and I let it go. 1 could not get under the 
snow and ice, because it had settled down on the water. So I 
turned on my back, feet foremost, and swam like a duck down this 
stream, which from there down was mostly open, at race-horse 
speed. Pretty soon I went under the ice, and presently went under 
it again, but each time came out svu'cessfully. The third place I 
came to 1 could not get under for a log and some brush. I then 
turned on my face, quick as thought— no time to consider— crawled 
over that place and into the creek below ; and went on down, in 
all two hundred and eighty yards. There I came to a jjlace where 
I knew that I must go ashoi-e. l^elow, the brush hung so densely 
over the creek that I could not hope to get along the channel. Be- 
sides, where I was, should I get out, the ground was bare of snow 
;uid my pursuers could not see me as easily as they could where 



TKAVELEES. 309 

there was snow. I lay in the head of a ditch fully one-fourth of an 
hour, waiting for them to get out of the way. I remained thei*e 
untU I found that I must get out of the icy water or perish. By 
the greatest effort I succeeded in getting out, and on my hands and 
knees, for half a mile, I crawled over the frozen granite sand, which 
must be seen before it can be understood, over rocks, mahogany 
brush, crystallized snow, sharp as needles, until I wore all the skin 
off of my hands, knees and shin bones from my knees to my ankles , 
I finally reached a mill, where I made myself known and was taken 
care of. As soon as I got into the hands of friends, I became un- 
conscious, and remained so for four hours. 

Tliis was a most wonderful escape. He bad sixteen bul- 
lets shot tlirougli his clothing. One ball had passed throngh 
the top of his head, and laid the shin open to the skull bone. 
One bullet broke his little finger, and one struck his thigh 
in front, ran around under the leaders, back of the knee, 
and came out in front by the shin bone. Another shot struck 
him in the calf of the left leg, and another in the right hip. 
One flash of powder left the burnt marks on his forehead. 
It was three months before he was able to get around. He 
attempted to convict the desperadoes who assaulted him ; 
but he could not do it. There was always some one to hang 
the juries who tried them. 

In 1868, in Idaho, came the Indian War, in which A. C. 
Minear took an active part ; and from a large collection of 
his letters, written at and after that time, a great amount of 
history may be learned. A few extracts are given to show 
how he spent his life while there : 

The Indians are continually breaking into the settlements and 
driving away cattle. They are not even content with this ; but 
kill people whenever they get an opportunity to do so. They 
shoot poisoned arrows. Pool was out with a man who was shot 
through the arm with a poisoned arrow. Pool drew his silk hand- 
kerchief through the wound and wiped the poison out. 

The Indians have been at their deviltrv again. They think that 



310 HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

they can do as they please. But, the stockmen are organizing for 
the defense. We have just returned from a campaign into their 
country. Some days ago a company of stockmen, about forty in 
number, followed a band of Indians about one hundred miles 
south. Nothing was heard of them for ten days, when one of their 
number came into camp and reported that the whole party of 
vdiites were surrounded by one thousand Indians, and that battle 
had been raging for two days when he escaped. He had gotten 
away by crawling at night on hands and feet for miles through the 
sage brush. The ammunition of the whites was nearly exhausted 
when he left, and he knew not what fate may have overtaken them 
ere that time. 

It did not take long to organize a large force to go to the rescue. 
In a few hours every available cayuse [horse] was pressed into ser- 
vice, and two hundred men, well mounted and armed, were upon 
the road leading southward in the direction of the Indians. 

I was one of the company. We put spurs to our horses, and did 
not stop for anything. In ten hours we had marched one hundred 
miles, surprised and routed the Indian army and had rescued the 
stockmen who were reduced to the last extremity. Many of the 
whites had been killed and more wounded. Many of the Indians 
had been killed. They had retreated into the lava beds where it 
was impossible to follow them. 

******* 

The Chinese will come in here in spite of the Indians. Some 
years ago [In 1864] two hundred of them were killed in one drove 
by Indians in Eastern Oregon, as they were en route to the mines. 
Their white bones lay for three years bleaching among the sage 
brush, and were finally boxed up by their supersticious brethren 
and shipped back to China, to await the grand resurrection of the 
Celestials. 

A. C. IMinear remained in Idaho till the close of the Civil 
AVar. Reengaged in several kinds of business. For awhile 
he was in the employ of Wells, Fargo and Co.'s Express, at 
a salary of three hundred dollars a month. When he left 
Idaho, he returned to San Francisco and was interested in 
some mines there. From there he returned by steamer to 



TRAYELEKS. 311 

New York, and thence home. He made three other trips to 
California, the last in 1876. One trip to San Francisco and 
back, from Eovvlesburg, was made in twelve days. With the 
close of the Centennial Year his desire for wandering seemed 
to cease. He was in Philadelphia at the Centennial, and 
has traveled extensively over different portions of the west. 
After all his travels and adventures, he sums up the whole : 
" The world is nearer round than most people think it is. " 

When he settled permanently down in Tucker, he devoted 
himself to the development and improvement of the country. 
He had, up to that time, engaged to some extent in mer- 
chandising, during his stays in West Yirginia. When he 
quit this he engaged in the lumber business and had several 
logging camps. For awhile, he controlled and run C. R- 
Macomber's steam mill. 

In 1879 he married Miss Yilla Adams, daughter of Clerk 
John J. Adams, of St. George, and has since lived here. 
His son, A. C. Minear, Jr., is a lad four years old. 

In connection with Mr. Finley Toy, A. C. Minear took a 
large contract of lumbering on Shaffer's Fork, and comple- 
ted it in 1884. 

He took part in county politics in 1880, and announced 
himself as a Republican candidate for Sheriff. The Demo- 
cratic Convention nominated William E. Talbott for that 
office, and the campaign was one of the hottest ever in the 
county. The peculiar mixing and fusion of parties at that 
time will be fully and impartially given in the chapter on 
Newspapers, in this book. It was a stubborn campaign, 
and every inch of ground gained by either was by the other 
disputed to the extremest point. It may readily be suppos- 
ed that there was a peculiar mixing of parties, when it is 
stated that a Republican, A. C. Minear, was elected to office 



dVI HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

by a majority of one liundred and twenty-one, over the reg- 
ular Democratic nominee, a good man, in a county Demo- 
cratic by about two hundred majority. 

A. C. Minear was the successor of Ward Parsons, Esq., as 
Sheriff of Tucker County. He made a good officer, and 
even his opponents were willing to admit that no better 
Sheriff could be found to fill the office. 

A. C. Minear is a member of the M. E. Church, and is 
ever liberal in the support of all truly worthy undertakings, 
Avhether connected wdth the Church or not. He has done 
something for ever}- Church that has been built in the 
county since he has been a permanent resident of St. George. 
He makes no distinction between the different branches of 
the Church, although his preference is for his own. 

J. W. Minear has never returned to Tucker County to be- 
come a permanent resident ; but, he has visited his old 
Lome, and remained here one summer. He still lives amid 
the scones of his early mining days, at Silver City, Idaho. 

In December, 1875, he married Miss Laura Frances Harr, 
a girl twenty-two years of age, who had traveled in Japan. 
Their children are three in number, the oldest, Mabel Mil- 
ler Minear, the next, John Edgar Minear, and the name of 
the youngest is George Renard Minear. 

The family of five live in their comfortable home, on the 
bank of Jordan Creek, in tide distant land of Idaho. 

In 1870 Mrs. A. ¥. Minear left Idaho, and moved with 
Ler children to San Jose, California. Her object Avas to 
educate her children. Their children were Asby Pool, Clara 
Corrinth, John Ingersoll, Lucretia Maria, William Charles, 
and Frank Swift, six in all; the oldest and youngest are 
dead. 

In 1870, A. P. Minear left Idaho and joined his wife at 



TKAVELEKS. 313 

San Jose. Reverses had again overtaken him, and he had 
no money. As he has said: "Our combined capital was 
only seventy-five cents." A. H. Bonnifield was in Califor- 
nia at that time, and happening to be at Minear's, he gives 
the following account in one of his letters : 

Mrs. Minear went to the wardrobe with a candle, and accident- 
ally set the clothes that were in there on fire. I grabbed the tea- 
kettle from the stove and ran with it to put out the fire ; but I did 
not arrive in time to be of any service. The clothes were all 
burnt up. 

And to this, A. P. Minear adds in his journal : 

We had no money ; and while in that fix, Mrs. Minear went into 
the wardrobe and set the clothes on fire, and they burnt before any 
could be saved. This left us with only the clothes we had on. 

But reverses had come too often for this to discourage a 
man of his resolute spirit ; and lie borrowed money, moved 
to San Francisco and at once engaged in business. He was 
in the mines again, and Avas superintending nine mines and 
was receiving a salary that aggregated two thousand six 
hundred and fifty dollars a month, and he had made eighty 
thousand dollars besides. Nor did he stop until he had run 
it up to several hundred thousand dollars, making or losing 
a fortune every year. The principal part of his mining was 
done in Idaho, although he operated to some extent in the 
Comstock mine, in Nevada. 

In 1876 Mrs. Minear and her children visited St. George, 
and went on to Philadelphia to attend the Centennial. 
The next year, 1877, A. P. Minear quit mining and engaged 
in a railroad enterprise in Georgia and Florida. He worked 
hard for three years on that railroad, and finally failed to 
succeed. He had spent on it all the money he had or could 
get, and he was left without money and out of business. 

He then tiirned toward New York City to engage again 



314 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY 

in ni i:iug. He landed there with five dollars and fifty cents. 
He spent the fifty cents,and lost the five dollars in the street. 
This left him in a strange city, entirely without money. 
However, he knew the tables so well that he sncceeded in 
buying on credit a half interest in an Arizona mine for 
twelve thousand five hundred dollars. He traded upon it, 
and realized one hundred and fifty thousand dollars. He 
put some of it back in the same mine, and put ninety thou- 
sand in another mine and lost it a],l. In the meantime he 
had built two quartz mills in Arizona, the scene of his late 
gains and losses in the mining business. 

Then he tried Idaho again, and spent the year of 1882 in 
the mines of Wood River, in that Territory, and there he 
still holds property. 

Since December, 1883, he has been traveling in search of 
mines through Arizona, Mexico, California, Nevada and Or- 
egon. The following is from a letter written subsequent to 
his last visit to New York: 

On my arrival in New York, after being gone more than twenty- 
eight years, I at once sought to find the wliereabouts of Mr. Wain- 
right, if living. I soon found him in the same house and in the 
same business where I introduced myself to him when I was on the 
road to California, in 1849. He remembered me and said: "Oh 
yes, you are the boy who wanted to buy that big red apple, and 
send it back home."* 

David S. Minear is the only one of a family of nine who 
remained at home. He has always been a farmer, and has 
been successful as such. He was also a merchant for a 
number of years. On December 31, 1867, he was married 



• While In New York, on lil3 way to California, be saw a One red apple In a window, 
and wanted to buy it and send It back to his Irlends in Virginia. His young friends 
Informed him that the apple was only painted wood. This was the apple to which 
the old gentleman referred. 



TEAYELEES. 315 

to Miss Mary J. Parsons, daughter of W. E. Parsons. 
Their children are five, Creed W., Joseph P., John W., C' 
Bruce and Mary Catharine. 

He pays especial attention to improved stock, and his 
farm produces fine specimens of blooded cattle and other 
domestic animals. The most improved machinery is also 
used in his fields, and an appearance of thrift and industry 
is seen everywhere about his premises. The fruit of his 
orchards is of the best varieties. 



CHAPTER XVII. 
THE V>'AB. 

The gi-eat Civil War, that threatened for a while to 
destroy the good as well as the bad of American institutions, 
was felt with all its terrors in Tucker County. When that 
mighty struggle came on, the people of Tucker County were 
not slow in choosing which side they would espouse. Be- 
tween the North and South they were nearly evenly divided ; 
or, if there was any difference, it was in favor of the South. 
On Dry Fork the Northern men were in the majority and 
about St. George the Southern men. Early in 1861 the 
lines began to be closely drawn, and the different factions 
assumed hostile attitudes toward each other. Neighbor was 
against neighbor, and people, in the suddenness with which 
men espoused one or the other cause, scarcely knew who 
was a friend and who was an enemy. The warlike prepara- 
tions in the East and South had their influence among the 
mountains of Tucker sooner than one would be apt to 
suppose. 

Late in May, 1861, a Confederate flag was raised in St. 
George, under the superiutendency of Abe Bonnifield, who 
was in sympathy with the Confederate cause from the very 
first. He with others had raised the flag,,and had kept it 
floating over the Court-house by day. At night they took 
it down, lest some of the Union citizens should cut it down 
in the darkness. It was viewed with jealousy and hatred 
by the Union men, of whom there were many in and about 



THE WAK. 317 

St. George, but not enoiigli to tear down by force the flag 
wliicli tlie Soutliern men had raised. 

Burning under the insult, which, in being offered to their 
country was offered to them, the Union party sought re- 
venge from outside help. They sent to Eowlesburg, where 
Captains Miller and Hall had under their commands a body 
of troops, and there made knovm that the Confederate flag 
was floating over the St., George Court-house and asked 
that soldiers be sent to cut it down. The promise of this 
was readily given ; and, on Sunday evening, June 9, 1861, 
Miller and Hall, with forty men, left Eowlesburg for the 
purpose of falling upon St. George unawares. They did not 
expect to meet with armed resistance, but. it being in a time 
of excitement, they thought it best to avoid, as far as possi- 
ble, all risk, and, therefore, went in the night. 

They reached St. George very early Monday morning, 
and proceeded to arrest several persons, whom they sus- 
l^ected of sympathizing with the South. They found no 
person inclined to oppose or harm them, and, without con- 
troversy, they proceeded to search for flags. They found 
two which they at once captured with great formality and 
ado, although no one attempted to defend the flags or dis- 
pute the right to take them. This finished, their mission 
was done ; and, when they had liberated the prisoners taken, 
they were ready for the return. ^None of those captured 
were held to answer any charges, and the whole aftair 
ended more like a Fourth of July celebration than a war- 
like demonstration. 

With the captiu'ed flags, which were flaunted in victory, 
the troops set out for Eowlesburg. On the way they found 
a rattlesnake, which tliey tied to one of the flags, and fas- 
tened a wildcat skin to the other. Bedizzened now fully to 



318 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

satisfy the exultations of childlike triumph, the forty men, 
■with their leaders in front, marched grandly into Rowles- 
burg, having first dispatched a special messenger to an- 
nounce their approach. The troops marched out to meet 
the returning heroes, and all as one body went into camp, 
ending the campaign by a grand trimuphal entry into 
Rowlesburg. 

Thus ended the first page of St. George and Tucker 
County in the war. The next was not to pass so lightly 
away. By this time large bodies of Rebels were fortifying 
themselves on Laurel Hill, near Belington, in Barbour, and 
in Randolph were large numbers. The Yankees had strong 
forces along the railroad, at Rowlesburg and elsewhere,tlius 
placing Tucker County, in a measure, between the two 
armies. Several of Tucker's citizens, among whom were 
William E. Talbott, E. Harper and William Harper, were 
now in the Confederate ranks. The two Harpers were on 
scout duty. ^\ illiam Harper was in Barbour County, watch- 
ing the movements of the Yankees, while E. Harper was in 
Tucker for the same purpose. Rebel Home Guards had also 
been organized, among whom were David and Nelson Par- 
sons, Ho}^ Goff and others. The Union cause seemed to be 
losing ground in Tiicker, although there were man}' still 
loyal to the Union, among whom might be mentioned Dr. 
Solomon Parsons, Enoch Minear, William Corrick and sev- 
eral others of our most respected citizens. 

As the month of June passed by, the war-spirit grew more 
violent, and the official functions of our county were pretty 
well broken up. The Union side were desirous, as they 
should be, of increasing their strength, and for that purpose 
were proceeding to hold elections in the county. 

This was about tlie twenty-eighth of June, 18G1. The 



THE WAR. 319 

Rebels, under Garnett, were hovering close upon the county, 
having thousands of men within a day's march of St. 
George. When it was heard in the Rebel camps that the 
Yankees were holding an election, Lieutenant Robert 
McChesney was sent into Tucker, partly on a scouting expe- 
dition and partly to disturb the proposed election. On the 
night of June 28, he, with a body of troops, halted at the 
house of Job Parsons, in the Holly Meadows, and staid 
over night. The next day the election was to be held, and 
very early in the morning McChesney and his men departed 
for St. George, five miles distant. When they reached 
there, they found that no move had been made toward hold- 
ing an election, but it was well understood that at Hannahs- 
ville, eight miles down the river, an election would be held, 
under the guard of Yankees from Rowlesburg. Some of 
McChesney 's men were sent into other parts, and some of 
the Home Guards joined him, and he proceeded to Han- 
nahsville. The following letters, relating to the subject, 
were furnished the author by Mr. J. Z. McChesne}', of 
Charleston, W. Ya., a brother to Lieutenant McChesney. 
The first was written by Mrs. Mary A. See, a lady well re- 
membered here, but now dead. Her letter reads thus : 

St. GrKOROK, Va., July 3, 1801. 

My Pear Frik:s'd: — Before this reaches you, you will have re- 
ceived the moiu-nful intelligence of Lieutenant McCheisiiey's deatli. 
I write, because you will wish to hear every particular. On Satur- 
day, June 29, it was reported that the Union men would hold an 
election eight miles below St. George, protected by a large guard 
from the Northern army. Lieutenant McChesney went down with 
a party of ten men as scouts. When within half a mile of the 
house, he ordered his men to return. Just as they turned their 
horses, a party of men, who were lying in ambush, rushed out and 
cut off their retreat. They fired on each other. Part of our men* 
dashed up the mountain, and part attempted to cut their way 

* Tlie Rebels. 



320 HISTOEY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

through them. Lieutenant McChesney was killed on the spot, Mr. 
Paxton badly wounded, and two others wounded, not so badly. 
Some of the men say they saw him* lying dead, the horse standing 
by him, and the bridle in his hand. Some of the Northern men 
requested the people at the election to bury him, which was done 
that evening. 

The next morning Mrs. Talbott went down to see if the body 
could be obtained, as his brother oflHcers exj^ressed a very strong 
desire to obtain it.t 

Sabbath night we hired several menj to go at the risk of their 
lives and bring him here. The company to which he belonged was 
to come here to take him away ; but next morning an express was 
sent, telling us to bury him here. He had been brought to Mr. 
Ewin's,§ one of the most prominent menin this region. "We would 
have had a neater coffin made, but it was reported that the enemy 
was approaching, and a good Avorkman could not be procured. 
Notice had been privately given, and ladies came five miles to at- 
tend the funeral. Sentinels were placed out ; a few of the Home 
(ruards attended ; twenty-four guns were fired over his grave, and 
while it was filling, the old familiar hymn was sung : 

AVlien I can read my title clear. 
We laid him in a retired and beautiful spot, shaded by several fine 
trees, and commanding a beautiful view of Cheat River and the 
adjacent village of St. George. It was a spot selected by Mr. Ewin, 
for a family burying ground. A lovely daughter of his sleeps 
there. 

The Lieutenant's grave was surrounded by tender and sympa- 
thizing hearts; for nearly all had near relatives in the army, and 
we knew not how soon the hand of the stranger would lay them in 
their last resting place. A musket ball had penetrated his body in 
tlie left side, near the heart. 

Till Christ sliall come to rouse the slumbering dead. 
Farewell, pale, lifeless claj-, a long farewell : 
Sweet be thy sleep beneath the green tree's shade. 
Where we have laid thee In thy lonely cell. 



* McChesney. 

t From the circumstances we infer that Mrs. Talbott was not successful in obtaining 
permission to talce away Lieutenant McCliesney's body. 
: These men were Abraham Talbott, Peter Bolion and John Auvll, Sr. 
§ Senator William Kwin. 




Mrs. B. S. Minear. 



THE WAE. 321 

My dear friend, may our blessed Savior comfort you all, particu- 
larly the mother ; and, O, that he may sanctify to us all the heavy 
afflictions with which he is visiting us. 

Your Sincere Friend, Mary A. See. 

Tlie following is a copy of Colonel Irvine's letter, wliicb. 
lie wrote from Oakland, July 21, 1861. Colonel Irvine had 
command of tlie troops by wliom McCliesney was killed, 
and his letter shows him to have been a brave man, for 
none but a brave man could deal so fairly and so honorably 
with an enemy who had fallen in battle. The letter reads 

thus : 

Headquarters 16th Re&'t, Ohio Vols., > 
Oakland, Maryland, July 31, 1861./ 

To the Friends of Lieut. Robert McChcs)iei/, 1st Lieut. Va. Cavalry : 
No opportunity having occurred, giving me a reasonable hoi^e of 
reaching you before this tiiue, is my excuse for not writing you 
sooner. You have, no doubt, learned long before this of the time 
and manner of Lieut. McChesney's death, I will, therefore, not 
speak of it further than to say that he bore himself gallantly, and 
my sympathies were greatly enlisted for him Avhen he fell. What 
should have been our common country, lost a brave and gallant 
man. I am in possession of his personal effects, which would be 
invaluable to you ; and, it would afford me great pleasure to know 
that they were restored to you. If you will indicate to me the 
channel through which I shall forward them, it shall be done im- 
mediately. Amongst other things, I have his pocket-book, $ iu 

money, gold shirt buttons, breast pin, several i:)apers (of no value) 
and some other little articles, not now remembered. His arms Avill, 
of course, be retained, being contrabrand. My term of service is 
about to expire. Please Avrite me at Coshocton, Ohio. 

Very llespectfully, .Tames Irvine, 

Ool. (Jomd'g 16th Reg't, O. M. V. 
The accounts of McChesney's death differ a' little in 
the minutia. One account says that he was killed l.)y 
Captain Miller with a pistol which had that morning been 
borrowed from John A. Peters, of Eowlesburg. As this 
story runs. Miller, wdth others, heard that the Confederates 

SI 



322 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

'vere advancing, and having dressed themselves in citizens' 
clothes, went up the road and stood by the wayside as if 
merely looking at the soldiers pass. McChesney and his 
men passed by, not suspecting that the men whom they saw 
■were Union soldiers M'ith arms hidden under their clothes. 
"When the Rebels had gone a little further down the road, 
they found themselves confronted by Miller and his dis- 
guised soldiers, and from the shot of Miller's revolver, the 
brave Lieutenant was killed."' 

Certain it is, that the Confedrates passed a squad of 
Yankees, seen or unseen, and shortly after were attacked 
from the front by another body of the Union forces, and in 
falling back found themselves hemmed in between two ene- 
mies. Some tried to escape up the hill, and did escape 
with the loss of horses, guns and accoutrements. One 
crossed the river, and escaped. McChesney, Paxton and 
others attempted to cut their way through the Y'ankees who 
were in the road behind him.t A great many guns were 
fired. The Rebels had double-barrelled shot giins.^ One 
Yankee was shot in the back of the head as he ran, and fell, 
mortally wounded.§ 

McChesney was shot through, but did not fall from his 
horse until the horse had its leg shot nearly ofi', when both 
rider and horse fell together. McChesney never showed 
signs of life after ho fell. It is said that his hand still 



* Mr. Daniel K. Dumire, a trusfivortliy citizen of Tucker, claims to have seen and 
heard the substance of tills stoi-y.| [He heard Miller boast of lillling McChesney w-lthln 
an hour from the time ^t happened. |i He also^saw the flglit. 

t It is said that, when he saw that lie was surrounded, ^McChesney drew his sword 
and called to his men : " We must cut our way through them ! " 

t The barrels of one of these guns were recently found near the battle-ground and 
are ;itlll In the possession of C. L. Bowman, of St. George, W. Va. 

§ His comrades placed him in a canoe and started to Kowlesburg with him. lie dir J 
ju:r. before reaching there, having lived live or six houi-s. 



THE WAK. 323 

grasped bis bridle rein. He fell upon a small log, entirely 
free from his wounded horse. 

Paxton succeeded in breaking through the lines of the 
enemy, but. was shot through the body. He rode on some 
distance, when he became so weak that he could not ride. 
He dismounted and hid near the road and remained there 
till night, when he was found and taken to St. George by 
William Harper. All the others got away, and two of them 
were wounded. 

The Home Guards and the soldiers whom McChesney had 
left about St. George were following on down. When they 
passed Miller Hill they heard of the skirmish but did not 
learn whether any or how many of the men had been killed. 
It was deemed best to retreat, and all did so but William 
Harper. He expressed his determination to proceed until 
he learned more of the missing men. He went on until al- 
most in sight of the battle ground, where he found Paxton's 
horse, which was slightly wounded. Concluding that the 
rider must have been killed, Harper caught the horse and 
with it returned to St. George. Before dark, all the men 
came in but McChesney and Paxton. McChesney had been 
seen to fall, but Paxton was beyond the lines when last seen, 
and it began to be hoped that he had escaped. After night- 
fall, William Harper, a braver man tlian wlioni never lived, 
went down to hunt for Paxton. He met him slowly making 
his way on foot up the road, badly wounded. Harper car- 
ried him to town, and there he was taken care of. 

On Sunday night John Anvil, Abraham Talljott and Peter 
Bohon went to Hannahsville and brought away the dead 
bod^' of McChesney. They went in a sled, in order that 
they might not be heard, since a wagon would be so noisy. 
No one disturbed them, and with the object of their mission, 



324 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

they reached Mr. Ewin's before day, and the burial took 
place, as is described in Mrs. See's letter. The Rebels then 
left the county, going back to the main body of soldiers in 
Barbour and Randolph counties. As they went they took 
prisoner Judge S, E. Parsons and William Hebb, and tying 
them together, carried tliem off. 

The site of the battle of Hannahsville is about eight miles 
below St. George on the Rowlesburg road, and may still be 
pointed out. The thicket of brush where the Yankees lay 
hidden, has since been cut down, and a few other changes 
liave taken place ; but the whole is yet an object of interest 
lis it is the site of the first blood-shed in Tucker County 
in war since the close of the old trouble with the Indians. 
The Union forces amounted to six hundred men. McClies- 
ney had about ten. The loss in killed was one on each side. 
The Yankee Avas shot in the back of liis head as he was 
running. 

Lieutenant Robert MoChesuey was born in Rockbridge 
(!ounty, Virginia, June 30, 1832, and died June 29, 1861, 
aged twenty-nine, wanting one day. He had a good 
education and was b}' occupation a farmer. He possessed 
the iinest business qualifications. In politics he was a 
Whig, as that branch of the Republican party was then 
(tailed, and of such integrity was he that he was the leader 
of the. part}' in the coinniunity where he resided. From 
early life lie manifested a strong predilection for military 
pursuits, and while yet (piite young was elected Lieutenant 
of a compan}' of cavahy. He had l)een for several years, 
and was at the breaking out of the Avar, Adjutant of the 
regiment of militia to which his company belonged. His 
voice was loud, clear and distinct. His commands co\ild Ijc 
])lainly lieard from one end of liis regiment to the other. 



THE WAR. 325 

Descending from a long line of ancestry distinguisliecl for 
their patriotic devotion to their country and a love of lib- 
erty, Lieutenant McChesney was among the first to offer 
his services when the Governor of Virginia called for troops 
to repel invasion. None of the Mother of Presidents' heroic 
sons were prompter than he to respond to the call for aid. 
McChesney was a man whose personal apx^earauce would 
claim for him notice anywhere."^"' His frame was wiry and 
well knit, capable of enduring great fatigue ; he was tall in 
stature and of a commanding mein, and was one among the 
finest riders in the Rebel army, where every cavalryman was 
a splendid horseman.t He was quick of perception, and 
had the eye of an eagle. He was generous to a fault and 
fearless in danger, possessing all the qualities that go to 
make a dashing cavalier, and had he not been so suddenly 
cut off he would undoubtedly have written his name beside 
those of Ashby and Stuart, high on the scroll of fame. It is 
said by one who knew whereof he spoke that Lieutenant 
McChesney was the only cavalry officer who attempted to 
rally his men or bring order out of confusion and chaos on 
the day of the Philippi rout and retreat. He possessed the 
confidence and respect of his superior ofiicers, and the love 
and admiration of his subordinates and equals.:]; 



• I once met a lady on the Pacific Coast, who had seen McChesney on the morning of 
his death, as he went to the battle, and she spoke repeatedly of the splendid appear- 
ance of the young Lieutenant on horseback, and how dignified, gallant and heroic 
lie looked as he led his men to the battle. Slle said that his horse seemed conscious of 
the worth of its rider, ami bore itself as proudly as a Saxon war horse, carrying a 
knight in araior. 

t Impartial judges state that, as a whole, the Rebel cavaliy, during the War, pos- 
sessed the finest riders of any cavalry in the world. They rode nearly equal to the 
wild horsemen of Texas and California. 

t Col. Irvine, by whose regiment McChesney was killed, afterwards said that the 
young Lieutenant was the bravest man he ever saw ; and, as he charged down so 
gallently upon the Federals, he hoped to see him escape the hail of bullets that were 
showered upon him. Even his enemies in war expressed sorrow that so heroic a man 
should meet so unthnely fate, and so young. 



320 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

But, all the promise of renoM n were cut oif and destroyed 

wlien he fell on that bright summer morning. 

On the bosoiHgof his Mother State Lieutenant McChesney offered 
up his Hfe a martyr to hberty and State Rights. He was the idol 
of his widowed mother, who, though doubly widowed by his tragic 
death, sent forth her two remaining sons to battle for her V^eloved 
Southland. Brave son of a Spartan mother ! the sunny Clime of 
Ancient Greece never produced two nobler or more heroic spirits. 
Some may accuse him of rashness ; but, during three years in the 
saddle in time of war I have seen quite as daring feats as he at- 
tempted, successfully executed.* 

Had his men followed him when he gave the command to 
charge, it is not improbable that they would have succeeded 
in cutting through that serried ])lialanx of glittering steel, 
and added fresh laurels to Virginia power and glory. He 
was respected, honored and loved by all who knew him in 
life. By his brave and heroic death he compelled and won 
the respect even of his enemies. He filled all the stations 
of life nobly and faithfully. He gave his life for his country. 

Whether or not his cause was a just one has nothing to 
do in the consideration whether or not he was a hero. A 
belief is right when a man will die for it. No vicious pas- 
sion should assail a man Avho is willing to offer up his life 
to a cause which he advocates. With him and between him 
and the eternal tribunal of truth and justice it is right. 
Wlien other men and other times shall come to judge us as 
we were, the jealousy and prejudice that surrounded us in 
life will have passed away, and what of good there was in 
us will then be seen, not through a glass darkly, but clearly 
and truly. Generations that shall come centuries hence, 
and Avho perchance shall ask of us, will not inquire who 
wore the blue and who wore the gray. It is little we care 



An extract from a letter written hy a Confederate officer. 



THE WAK. 327 

who wore the Red Eose autl who the AVhite, in the wars of 
York and Lancaster. Less still — ^for times are changing — 
will those who come after us care who wore the blue and 
who the gra}'. Men and results will be all that will be 
asked for ; and, then, all passion gone, as a man will be 
named Lieutenant Robert McChesney. 

The war in AVest Virginia was now fairly begun. The 
Confederates held strong positions in Barbour and Ran- 
dolph, and McClellan with thirty thousand men was ad- 
vancing upon them. Garnett, the Confederate General, had 
between four thousand and five thousand men. The odds 
were seven to one against him. On July 8, 1861, was 
fought the battle of Laurel Hill or Belingtou. 'Che Confed- 
erates fell back. On July 11, the battle of Rich Mountain 
was fought, and the Confederates were again defeated. In 
these fights very few men were killed, and Garnett did not 
fall back on account of the destruction that had been done 
his army. But he knew how much strength his enemy had, 
and he suspected that the design was to cut him oft' from 
the roads leading south, and then, in case of defeat, to com- 
pel him to surrender. 

A mistake on the part of some of his scouts strengthened 
the belief, and brought on disasters which might have been 
avoided. His scouts reported that the}^ had seen X^nion 
troops ill Beverly, and that the road bej'oud was blockaded. 
The road vv-as blockaded, and they had seen troops in Bev- 
erly ; but, the troops were Confederates, and the road had 
been blockaded by Confederates. Xot knowing the truth 
of the matter, and belieA'iug that ho was being ra})idly sur- 
rounded by thirty thousand men, Garnett deemed it best to 
retreat while he could, by the only road yet open, that to 
fSt. George, thence to the North-Avesteru Turnpike, and by 



328 HISTORY OF TUCKEE COUNTY, 

it to Mount Storm, tlie summit of the Allegliauies, and 
from there through Greenland Gap, back to Virginia. Al- 
most immediately after forming this plan, he found part of it 
frustrated. The direct road to St. George, that down Clo- 
ver Run, was so open to attack from overwhelming numbers 
of the Federals, if indeed, it was not already in their hands, 
that it was decided unwise to retreat by that route. 

The only way still open for the artillery and wagons was 
that across Laurel Hill at the head of Pleasant Run, down 
that stream to Shafer's Fork, down it and the river to the 
Horse Shoe, and thence up either Mill Run or Horse Shoe 
Run to the North-western Road. This was a hard line of 
retreat for an army heavily encumbered with baggage and 
stores; but there was no other, except Dry Fork, and that 
way was utterly impassable for wagons and artillery. 

Misfortunes were thickening around the Confederates. 
The two brothers, William and Ezekiel Harper, had been 
sent off as scouts to see if the way was open at all. The 
former had been scouting in Barbour for several days, and 
had twice approached within a mile and a half of Philippi 
while the Union forces were there. E. Harper had been 
watching the movements of the Federals who Avere pushing- 
eastward along tlie North-western Pike from Grafton, and 
had fortilied tlicuiselves on Bufi'rJo and at West Union 
(Aurora), and seemed to be concentrating their forces so as 
to strike either the Mill Run or the Horse Shoe Run road, 
whichever one the Confederates should attempt to escape 
by. Gaviu^tt w.-is, indeed, in a critical situation, and a de- 
lay of a few days would r)r(^ve fatal. Ho, therefore, decided 
to retreat at onc(\ In a. short time his army was in motion, 
the cavalry in front, and then the long train of ponderous 
wauons and infantrv. The Union General soon learned 



THE WAE. 329 

that tlie retreat had commenced, and General Morris went 
in pursuit with about five thousand men. 

The Confederates encamped the first night on Pleasant 
Bun. The next morning, as their rear was leaving camp, 
the Federals came up and fired on them. A slight skirmish 
ensued, and the Confederates escaped for the moment. 

Meanwhile, E. Harper, who had gained all the informa- 
tion he could concerning the position of the Union forces, 
was on his way to Kich Mountain to report. When he 
reached Ward Parsons', on Shafer's Fork, he learned that 
the Confederate army was retreating. He knew that the 
road along the hill near there was impassable for an army 
with wagons, and he hurriedly collected a score of .men with 
axes and commenced cutting a road through the bottom 
land. He left the men to complete this work, and he pushed 
on to meet the army. He met the advance near the mouth 
of Pleasant, and the officers, when they learned that the 
Horse Shoe Eun road was the only one open, requested 
him to pilot the army through by the shortest and safest 
route. Harper insisted on turning back to fight, saying that 
he could kill more Yankees than any thirty Rebels. He 
was reprimanded for his rashness, and was told that the ob- 
ject was not to kill Yankees but to get that army out of its 
present situation. The firing in the rear had already begun, 
and the intention of all was to escape as soon as possible. 
He accepted the position of pilot, and moved forward with 
the van. About forty of the Spottsylvania cavalry were 
sent over the mountain under the guidance of J. M. Corrick, 
to see if the Federals held the Clover Run road ; for it was 
feared that the}^ vrould cross from Philippi to St. George, 
and cut off the retreat there. Corrick guided the detach- 
ment through mountain paths, down Clover to St, George, 



.'530 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

He found the wa}- clear, and passed up the river to Max- 
Avell's and there re-joined the main armj-, and was then re- 
leased from further service.* 

Meanwhile, the fight at Corrick's Ford was in progress. 
Below the mouth of Pleasant Run it was seen that opposi- 
tion must be oftered to the pursuing Federals. Two com- 
panies of Georgians were placed in ambush to fall upon the 
liauk of the Union army, Avliile the main body of the Con- 
federates were to attack from the front. At Corrick's Ford 
the Rebels planted their cannon, and, as the front of the 
Union army came down to the water's edge, opened on them 
Avith a volley of grape-shot. The two regiments of Georgia 
troops did not fire, although they were ready, and waited 
only for the command. They were cut off from the main 
army and escaped up the mountain. They fell in with James 
Parsons who piloted them to Otter Fork, where they 
camped that night, and the next day crossed to Dry Fork, 
and by that route, after great suffering and hardships, they 
at last reached the Confederate lines. 

The front of the Confederate army had crossed Job's 
Ford, four miles below Corrick's Ford, when the firing com- 
menced. It was expected that the decisive battle would be 
fought there ; for the stand at Corrick's Ford 'was meant 
only to check the enemy momentarily. Accordingly, cannon 
were wheeled into position along the river bank, opposite 
Callihan's store, and the brush were cleared from the bluff 
above, ready to make of it an artillery field. 

At the moment the Rebels fired at Corrick's Ford, the 
road on the other side of the river was full of Yankees, 
who did not know of the presence of Rebels, except a few 

• J. M. Corrlck was a son of AVilUam Corrlck, after whom the Battle of Corrick's 
Ford was named. 



THE WAK. 3^1 

stvap;glers wlioni tliey did not think worth liriijj^ npon.'"" 
The Confederate cannon had been concealed, and when 
they fired, the Federals fell as one man. The officer in 
front had seen the guns just in time to call: "Flat to the 
ground!" and his men threw themselves flat in the road, 
and thus escaped the first vollej'. From the marks on the 
trees it is supposed that the first fire of the Rebels was fif- 
teen feet above the Yankees. But the other volleys that 
followed in rapid succession Avere not too high, for, a log 
that lay in the midst of the Yankees had in it 144 bullet 
holes when the battle was over. The firing across the river 
was rapid for a few minutes, and until the Union forces fell 
back. The Rebels then resumed tlieir retreat. Garnett, at 
this juncture, came back with his staff officers, McClung and 
others, and attempted to rally his men. They were sitting 
on their horses by the river bank, leaning forward in order 
to see under grapevines and limbs that grew thick there. 
Firing had again commenced, and as they leant forward on 
their horses' necks, a bullet shaved the mane from Garnett's 
horse, close to the rider's face. McClung advised him to get 
out of range of the bullets. The General replied that they 
might get away if they liked, leaving it to be understood 
that he Avould not get away. The next moment a ball struck 
him, and he fell from his horse mortally wounded. His 
army was now in full retreat, and he was left on the field. 
The Federals found him and carried him into the house of 
William Corrick, where Morris came, to visit him. He and 
Morris had been class-mates at West Point. The hatred 
that existed between the IS orth and South was forgotten by 

• A drummer boy, who had mounted a horse behind a sick soldier, was thrown 
from his horse into the water when tiring commenced. He lay under ^vater, except 
his face, during the battle, and then escaped unseen and made his way back to the 
army of Virginia. 



332 HI8T0KY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

tliem, and after Morris Lad done all that could be done for 
the wounded officer, Garnett died in the Union General's 
arms. The generous and magnanimous Morris showed every 
respect and kindness in his power to Garnett, and when he 
was dead, he dressed him in his own bhie uniform and sent 
him to his people in the South. 

The battle field was now clear of Confederates. Those 
"who could had fled, and the wounded and dead had been 
carried off. Corrick's house was made a hospital and a 
prison. The captured Confederates wore confined in the 
kitchen. 

The number of killed and wounded at Corrick's Ford is 
not and probably never can be known. No official reports 
can be found ; and other reports are as various as the per- 
sons are who make them. The entire loss on both sides is 
placed all the way from fifteen to three hundred. It was 
certainly more than fifteen and certainly less than three 
hundred. Of the Rebels, more than fifteen are known to 
have been killed. The Yankees would not acknowledge 
that the}" lost any ; but the evidence against this is too 
strong to admit of its belief. The trees and brush where 
the soldiers stood thick were torn and splintered by grape- 
shot and bullets, and it Avould have been a miracle if no sol- 
dier was struck. Besides, many persons claim to have seen 
numbers of dead Union men. It is claimed that they 
hauled several large wagon-loads of dead bodies to Ran- 
dolph, and buried them in the entrenchments. One trust- 
worthy man says that he counted one hundred and fourteen 
dead Union soldiers. The Rebels had a great advantage of 
ground, and made good use of it, and it would be a curious 
freak of chance if no Union soldier was killed. 

Be this as it maj', the Rebels failed to check and hold in 



THE WAE. 333 

check the Federals, and again started upon a retreat, which 
now became a ront in every sense of the word. The cannon 
and baggage were gotten from the fiekl, and the rout began 
in earnest. 

The position that had been taken at Job's Ford was 
abandoned, and the road was given to the retreating sol- 
diery. The rain fell in torrents, and the road was almost 
impassable on account of mud. The footmen straggled 
along as well as they could, and the tired horses tugged 
heavily at the ponderous wagons. 

When the van of the army reached White Oak, at Jesse 
Parsons', it met William Harper, who had come that morn- 
ing from West Union (Aurora). A consultation was at once 
had with him. He did not think it possible to get the 
wagons and caanon up Horse Shoe Run, and, therefore, 
advised the retreat to be made up Mill Run, at St. George. 
He did not think that the Union forces at West Union 
would offer material resistance to the arm3^ But, E. Har- 
per, who was better acquainted with the position of the 
Union army on Buffalo and along the North-western Pike, 
and also fearing that forces sent from Barbour would reach 
St. George in time to cut the army in two, still urged that 
the Horse Shoe Run road be taken, and it was taken. Wil- 
liam Harper passed on to the rear of the army, and was at 
the mouth of the Alum Hill Pass when the front of the 
Union army came in view. He fired upon them, and they 
halted, probably thinking that he was a picket and that the 
whole Rebel army was still at Job's Ford, a mile beyond. 
This one man checked the Federal army longer than Garnett's 
four thousand had been able to do ; for they fell back be- 
hind Alum Hill and remained there till the next day. 

The story of the retreat of that Rebel army is a sad one 



334 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

to relate. It resiilted partly from blunders, but is hard to 
say to whom the blunders were due. However, the Rebels 
at Rich Mountain must have been defeated sooner or later 
anyway, for four thousand men could offer but little resist- 
ance to thirty thousand. 

A portion of the Confederate infantry passed round Slij> 
Hill ; but the wagons, cannon and the. main body of the 
army crossed the river at Neville's Ford, where they came 
near drowning some of their men. They passed through 
the Horse Shoe to Nick's Ford Avhere they recrossed and 
took the road leading up Horse Shoe Run. The army was 
halted at Low Gap, and the officers consulted whether it 
Avould not be better to fight a battle there. Some of the 
artillery was wheeled into position on Holbert Hill. The 
pursuing army failed to put in an appearance. It was in- 
tended to open fire on them as soon as they came within 
range. 

While halting there, word came that the Union forces 
were fortif^'ing at the Red House with the intention of cut- 
ting off retreat by that route. This caused a change in the 
plans. It now became the object to escape the pursuing 
army by flight, and cut through the forces at the Red House. 
The artillery was brought up from the rear, and was sent to 
the front. Except the cavalry and artillery, there was no 
longer an}' warlike spirit in the army. Every man seemed 
to think only of saving himself. The stores and goods were 
thrown from the wagons. Mud holes were bridged with 
tents and blankets. Trunks were broken open and the con- 
tents scattered in every direction. Barrels of flour anvl 
sugar and rice and molasses were rolled from the wagons to 
be left or broken into by the excited and famishing soldiery. 
Guns were tlirown into tlie woods, and cartridge boxes were 



THE WAR. 335 

flung after them. Clothing was scattered on every side. 
Boxes of medicine were kicked out of the wagons to be 
trampled under foot. The soldiers were starving, while 
stores of provisions were being destroyed. Boxes of crack- 
ers and biscuits were broken open, and he who could 
helped himself. 

The exposure and the hunger since breaking camp at 
Rich Mountain had made many of the soldiers sick, and 
when they could no longer travel they were left to fall into 
the hands of whomsoever they might or die without atten- 
tion. There was no room in the wagons for the sick. A 
boy with his foot shot off got on a cannon and rode there. 
An officer dismounted and walked in order to let a sick sol- 
dier ride. The spirit of Southern generosity was not dead 
— it never dies — but, in that shameful panic, who could 
attend to anything but himself? There was plenty to keep 
the soldiers from starving, but no time was taken to deal it 
out to them. If the retreat had been two years later in the 
war, when experience in such unpleasant performances was 
more mature, there probably would not have been a man or 
a wagon lost. But, it came when it did, and it leaves 
nothing for the historian to do but to record it as it was. 

The horses suffered no less than the men. They toiled at 
the heavy wagons until they could move tlieni no more. 
When the men had thrown out the loads, the tired horses 
could again draw the empty wagons. But they could not 
long remain empty. The exhausted soldiers, who had fallen 
by the Avaj^side, struggled to their feet and climbed into the 
wagons, or, perchance were helped in by comrades, and the 
wagons were soon overloaded. It was useless to try to get 
them along. The teamsters cut the harness from the horses, 
and mounting them, fled. Then the axle-trees were sawed 



336 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

in two and the spokes cut from the wheels, and the road 
■vvas thus blockaded to prevent pursuit. But it also block- 
aded it against the following Confederates who came up, 
and being unable to get their wagons by, had to cut them 
to pieces and leave them. 

Every mile the panic became more deplorable. Soldiers 
without shoes went hobbling and limping along, their feet 
cut by the stones, and their tracks marked with blood. 
William E. Talbott was along, as was M. P. Helmick and 
many others still living in the county. Few pretended to 
carry arms. In the front some order was kept, but in the 
rear the sight beggars description. Some flung themselves 
by the roadside, and refused to be assisted forward by such 
of their comrades as were willing and able to assist them. 
The sick, who could, crawled to houses and lay there till 
the pursuing cavalry came up and took them prisoner. 
Some attempted to hide in the woods ; but, when the pur- 
suit came, it was useless to attempt concealment. Some 
thought to pass themselves off as citizens and thus escape 
the Yankees. But their woeful looks and haggard faces 
told the tale on them. 

The rabble extended ten miles. Every mile and every rod 
was marked with plunder and ruin. When night came on, 
the scene was worse, if it could have been seen. It was 
dark and rainy, and the remnants of the once splendid army 
struggled along the narrow road, not knowing wdien the 
guns of the pursuers would roar out on the night. The 
front, too, began to be demoralized. Reports came that the 
road at the Red House was held by five thousand Federals 
which was just ten times the actual number there. The cav- 
alry (partly excusable from tlie excitement of that awful 
night) thought that the army was beset both in front and 



THE WAE. 337 

in tlie rear, and that destruction awaited either an advance 
or a retreat. From Wotring's, the head of Horse Shoe 
Kun, there was an obscure and rugged path leading across 
the Backbone Mountain and the head waters of the North 
Branch and Stony River. This, to the cavahy, seemed the 
only possible avenue of escape, and it was barel}'' possible. 
Samuel Porter knew the path and acted as guide. The cav- 
alry thus left the road, unknown to the main army and the 
artillery, and crossed the mountain by this path. It is a 
myster}^ how that cavalry ever made that march. It was a 
narrow foot-path, traveled by mountaineers, and led over 
bluffs, mountains and ravines, and logs and rocks tilled it in 
every part. Besides, the darkness of the night, and the 
descending torrents of rain lent additional difficulty to the 
undertaking. Many of the horses were unshod, their shoes 
having been pulled off in the clefts and crevices of the rocks. 
The path was a rough one for horses shod with steel and in 
full strength and spirit ; and it was far worse for these that 
were hungry, lame and exhausted. 

When they got into the wild region about Stony Eiver, 
they were met by an old woodsman who mistook them for 
Yankees. He seemed anxious both to gain and to impart 
information. They saw that he was mistaken and told him 
such news as they thought he would like to hear. And he 
in turn told them that he was captain of the Home Guards 
in that quarter, and that his one hundred men could "bush- 
whack Rebels to beat the nation."'"' When they had drawn 
from him all the information they wanted, they informed 
him he was in the hands of Rebels. The old fellow's coun- 
tenance fell ; but, seeing that he was a prisoner, he went 

• Tills is on tlie authority of McCIung of Greenbrier County, wlio was an officer and 
was present. 



338 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

quietly along. Toward morning tliey came to a tributary of 
the North Branch, and the horses refused to leave it. They 
had unshod feet, which were broken and feverish, and they 
preferred to bathe them in the cool water. But at length 
they got the horses from the water, and at daylight came 
into the North-western Pike. 

The artillery and the infantry did not know that the 
cavalry had left the road, but supposed them still in front 
and that they would give notice of any danger. Thus de- 
luded, the army, if it can be called an army, advanced, and 
the artillery was in the very front. S. E. Parsons and 
William Hebb, who had been taken prisoner during Mc- 
Chesney's raid, were still prisoners in Garnett's army. Near 
Wotring's, Parsons determined to attempt an escape. He 
sprang from the guards, and leaped down a bank. A dozen 
guns were tired at him, but he escaped unhurt, hatless, and 
the next morning found himself beyond the Rebel lines. 
On the evening of the fourteenth of July, five hundred 
Federals had arrived at the Red House, ready to dispute 
the road with Garnett's army. They, too, had heard rumors, 
in common with the Rebels. They heard that Garnett's 
arni}^, although badly shattered, still had fifteen thousand 
fighting men. However, the}^ held their ground until the 
front of the army could be heard advancing, when they 
started in full retreat toward West Union. The Rebels 
were near enough to hear them going. 

This was after midnight, probably two o'clock in the morn- 
ing. The North-western Pike was reached at last. But a 
new danger was threatening them. It was said that a body 
of Union troops were stationed on the summit of Backbone 
mountain, ready to hem the Confederates in. A consulta- 
tion was held, while the soldiers, as fast as they came up. 



THE WAR. 339 

flung themselves upon the ground to sleep. There was no 
other means visible by which the army could be gotten out. 
It was known that armies were in Oakland, West Union, on 
Buflfalo, and in the rear, and the road across Backbone and 
the AUeghanies was all that remained open, if it, indeed, 
was open. It was thought best to send scouts to the top of 
the mountain, about four miles distant, to see if an enemy 
was there. In an army of four thousand, only five were 
found willing to go. They were E. Harper, Garrett John- 
son, Dr. William Bland, of Weston, and two cavalrymen. 
They left the Bed House about three o'clock in the morning 
and rode to the top of the mountain. Harper said that he 
felt more fear while going up that mountain than he ever 
felt before or since. But no enemy was found, and tliey re- 
turned to the Bed House and reported that the way was 
open. This was just at daylight, July 15. The army at once 
resumed its retreat, and before noon had passed the North 
Branch bridge, which it burned. From that point it was 
not pursued. The wrecked army made its way back to the 
South and was recruited and again placed in service. The 
Union army made no pursuit after Alum Hill was reached. 
The troops remained about the countr}^ and detachments 
went foraging on the trail of the Rebels to pick up strag- 
glers and plunder ; but no attempt was made to overtake 
the Rebels. The Union army went to St. George, and thence 
to Philippi and Belington. Some of those left to take charge 
of the wagons and plunder were set upon and shot as they 
were going up Clover Run. This was the largest military 
movement that ever took place in Tucker Count}-. The 
others were only raids. 

After Garnett's army retreated from the county, the Con- 
federates had little hold in it. The Unionists kept forces in 



340 HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

the county, and kept down any manifestation which Rebel 
citizens might have made. On Dry Fork the guerrilla war- 
fare between the Home Guards of each side went on una- 
bated. 

In September, 1862, the Federals had squads of men in 
Tucker. One squad w^as stationed at Abraham Parsons'. 
John Imboden had heard of it, and determined to drive 
them out. With William Harper as guide he struck across 
the mountains, intending to fall on the Yankees unawares. 
But Jane Snyder, then a young lady, now the wife of Mart 
Bennett, saw the Rebels, and, mounting her horse, she gal- 
loped off down Dry Fork to give the alarm. She reached 
the Yankee camp just in time to save them ; for, scarcely 
had she gotten away when the Rebels came up. The 
Yankees made no stop or stay until they had quit the coun- 
try. Imboden then returned to the South, and the Yankees 
returned to the occupation of Tucker. 

Capt. William Hall then came to St. George with twenty- 
nine men, and took up his headquarters in the Court-house. 
This was in November. Some of the Union citizens of the 
county sent insulting words to Imboden, taunting him. He 
at once set out for St. George with some small cannon 
lashed to the backs of mules. He came down Dry Fork, 
where there was then only a small path. William Harper 
was guide. The way was rougli, and the progress could not 
be but slow. One of his mules that carried a cannon 
slipped over the bank and tumbled a hundred feet, almost 
into the river. The men followed, and when they took the 
cannon off, the mule got up and Avas ready for traveling. 

Imboden was aiming for St. George, and was expecting to 
fall upon the Yankees by surprise. In this he w\as success- 
ful. He approached the town just after daylight, and had 



THE WAK. 341 

the Union forces surrounded before they knew of the pres- 
ence of a Rebel. Then a flag of truce was sent in to make 
a demand for the surrender of the forces. The man who 
bore the flag was fired upon and wounded in the foot by a 
sentinel, who then ran to the Court-house and gave the 
alarm. Immediately there was much excitement among the 
Yankees. When Hall learned that he was surrounded, he 
cried : "Boys, take care of your Captain !" 

The Rebels who had passed down the river fired a few 
times in the direction of the Court-house, but without effect. 
They found Enoch Minear feeding cattle just below town, 
and took him prisoner and detained him an hour or two. 

Meanwhile, negotiations for the surrender of the town 
were going on. Imboden offered honorable terms and Hall 
accepted. The Yankees were to be paroUed and allowed to 
depart in peace from the country. On these terms, St. 
George was surrendered. James Swisher was the only one 
who escaped. Finding himself some distance from the 
Court-house when the alarm was given, he took to his heels 
and got off. He carried the intelligence to Rowlesburg, 
where it created no small stir among the soldiers. 

Captain Hall's headquarters were in the Clerk's office. 
He was just sitting down to breakfast when the alarm was 
given. When the surrender was made, Imboden and his 
men sat themselves down around the table, and. with char- 
acteristic Southern hospitality, invited Hall and his fellow- 
officers to join them at the board and help eat the smoking 
breakfast. All sectional and national hatred was now for- 
gotten, and Yankee and Rebel, vanquished and victor, sat 
side by side and eat to their full satisfaction. Imboden's 
soldiers joined in with Hall's and all in common sat joking 
around the camp fires, and cooked and ate breakfast, forget- 



^ 



342 HISTOEY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

ting that a Avar of death had so lately raged between them. 
When breakfast was done, Hall and his men filed sullenly 
out of their comfortable quarters in the Court-house, and set 
forward for Rowlesburg. There came near being a difficulty 
regarding the shooting at the man who carried the flag of 
truce. The Rebels demanded that he be given up to be 
dealt with according to the rules of war. But the Yankees 
Avould not do this, o,nd in their turn charged the Rebels with 
violating the rules of war by advancing with their army 
under cover of the flag of truce. For, as was claimed, Im- 
boden was moving his men down the bank of the river while 
his truce-flag was being carried into the Yankee camp. 
Both sides seemed to be in the wrong, and they knew it ; and 
after much parleying and contention, it was agreed that 
nothing further should be done in the matter, and thus it 
was hushed. James Myers is now known to be the picket 
who fired on the flag. 

Hall surrendered twenty-nine men. The remainder of his 
company was not in St. George at the time. The Rebels 
numbered several hundred. Hall claimed that he had no 
ammunition, or he would have fought ; but his men had forty 
rounds of cartridges each. 

As Imboden approached town Dr. Solomon Parsons, who 
lived half mile from town, and who was extreme in his sym- 
pathy with the North, was down in the field feeding his 
cattle. He saw the Confederates go by, and suspicioned 
that they were after him. He fled toward the river, which 
he waded at the lower end of Wamsley's Island, and climbed 
the mountain beyond. In a little while he grew uneasy ; 
and, re-crossing the river, he ascended Dry Run, wading 
along its bed, for the snow was deep, and aimed his course 



THE WAE. 343 

for Cranberry Summit. The Eebels carried away some 
goods from liis store. 

"Wlien the Eebels had cleared St. George of Union sol- 
diers, they immediately retreated back the way they came, 
passing up Dry Fork, and over into Highland Connty, Vir- 
ginia. The raid was a dashing one, and was in every way 
successful to those who planned and executed it. But in 
the end it worked great jiarm to the Rebel citizens of 
Tucker, and to those wdio were suspected of being in sjm.- 
pathy with the South. 

When news of the surrender reached Eowlesburg, it pro- 
duced great commotion there. It was supposed that Im- 
boden meant to establish himself at St. George, and ar- 
rangements were at once made to expel him. A large body 
of troops was sent up to make an attack. When St. 
George was reached it was found that the Eebels were gone. 
The Yankees followed up to Abraham Parsons', and plant- 
ing their cannon there, bombarded the woods, trjdng to 
scare the Eebels out, for they affected to believe that Imbo- 
den was hidden among the neighboring mountains. But, 
really, at that time, Imboden was on the other side of the 
Alleghanies. 

While the Yankees remained at Abraham Parsons' they 
were wicked in their depredations, stealing and destroying 
almost everything they could find. They made raids into 
the surrounding country, and stole plunder. It was the 
most thieving band of soldiers ever in Tucker Count}-. One 
strippling soldier from Ohio stole a saddle and bridle on 
Dry Fork, but had failed to get a horse. He came back, 
lugging his pilfered plunder, and stopped at Parsons'. 
There was a tine horse in the field, and he concluded that it 
was good enough for him, and accordingly caught it and was 



344 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

going off when he was seen from the house. Parsons was 
not at home. His daughter Ninn and Job Parsons' daugh- 
ter Rebecca concluded to capture the horse. They tried to 
coax the fellow to give it up, and he would not, and they 
proceeded to take it by force. One of them took the scoun- 
drel by the neck and hurled him heels over head twenty 
feet among the sawlogs that lay in the mill yard. His wrath 
Avas terrible. The other Yankees raised a great laugh at 
him and cheered the girls, and that made him madder than 
ever. He sw^ore fearfully, and voAved that he would have 
the horse or die on the spot. But the girls led the horse 
into the yard, and when the determined young Yankee fol- 
lowed, they caught him and thrashed him. This satisfied 
liim for a while ; but at length he returned to get the horse, 
and they pounded him again and chased him out of the 
yard. Bj- this time the Yankees were getting read}' to go, 
and he stood at the gate as though trying to decide whether 
to make another venture or to give up. He decided to trj' 
again, and came up with the grim determination that he 
Avould have the horse. They seized him again and gave 
him an unmerciful wolloping, and he got out of the 3'ard in 
a hurry. He was whipped, and picking up his saddle, he 
sneaked off and appeared no more on the arena. 

About this time Kellogg came into command of the Union 
forces in Tucker, and instituted a kind of inquisition, 
known as the "Assessment." He levied a tax upon alls^'m- 
pathizers witli the South, and applied the money to pay Dr. 
Parsons, Enoch Minear and others who had lost property at 
the hands of the Rebels. The Assessment was a most 
Avicked and sljamcful allair. The world's history can hardly 
show tyranny more disgraceful. It is not just to charge it 



THE WAR. 345 

to the Union men in general ; for, they were far above any- 
thing of the kind, and had nothing to do with it. 

An order was issued to tax Rebel citizens to pay back 
what Union citizens had lost. The tax was not levied in 
proportion to the amount of property owned by the party 
so much as by the intensity of their Southern sympathy. 
Although, of course, some consideration was taken of the 
wealth of the individual and the amount which he was able 
to pay. Thus, AV. D. Losh was assessed $8, and had to sell 
his pants to raise the money. Rufus Maxwell was assessed 
$80 ; Nick Parsons, $500 ; W. R. Parsons, $700 ; Abraham 
Parsons, $800, and others in proportion. The order read 
thus : "■ 

You are hereby notified that, upon an Assessment, you are as- 

&essed • dollars, to make good the losses of Union men. If you 

fail to pay in three days, your property will all be confisicated, 
your house burned and yourself shot. 

By order of Brig. Gren. Milroy. 

Capt. KELLOG&, Comg. 123d Ohio. 

Nearly all the money was collected and paid over to those 
who claimed it. When it became known what Kellogg was 
doing, his su]3erior officers set about undoing his work ; for 
the Union men were too honorable to allow such work to be 
left alone. 

Joseph A. Paris was sent to St. George to stop the collee- 
tion of the Assessment and to pay back the money where it 
could be done. He fovmd the Union cause here in a bad 
condition. The tyrannous proceedings of the past few days 
had raised a storm of indignation, not only among the 
Southern men who were made to pa}'^ the Assessment, but 

* This Is from a copy, and it is possible tliat it contains errors; tout it is toelieved to 
1)6 correct in every particular. The copy is furnished toy Joto W. Parsons, of Rich 
Mountain. 



\ 



346 HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

also among nearly all the Union men, wlio had any feelings 
of manhood and freedom about them. For, be it repeated 
that the Union party in Tucker Count}^ were in no measure, 
or in a very small measure, guilty of aiding, abetting or 
countenancing the Assessment business. They hated it as 
intensely as they hated anything that was bad, and they 
showed no favors to those who assisted in the matter. 

So, when Faris came and it became known that he pro- 
posed to conduct his proceeding in accordance with the code 
of honor and not with that of revenge and rancorous hatred, 
he at once received the sympathy and support of the best 
and of nearly all of our citizens. In him they recognized 
a man not to be influenced and led about by bitter ani- 
mosities. He had a high sense of justice and right ; and no 
mutterings among his own party or threats or attempts 
among his enemies could influence him to depart from what 
was just. In the time of war, and when passion ran at fever 
heat, he made friends among Unionists and won the respect 
of the symj)athizers of the Confederacy. No one doubted 
his honor. No one feared that he would take a mean ad- 
vantage. No one believed that he Avould indorse any of the 
infamous proceedings of the past few weeks. Those whose 
conscience was guilty on account of deeds done, received 
little comfort from him. 

Our people remember him as a man, and not as a war- 
time leader. If all the military men who came into our 
county had been such as he, the war would be a forgotten 
thing with us. He undid what wrong he could, and showed 
his willingness to undo more. The confidence of our peo- 
ple underwent a change for the better, as regarded man and 
man. For, while the Assessment was in progress, only a 
spark would have sufficed to kindle the flame of war among 



THE WAE. 347 

our mountains and valleys, in whicli citizen would have 
fought citizen and the rage of revenge would almost have 
depopulated our country. Had the work gone on a little 
longer, it is hard to tell at what hour the torch would have 
been applied to dwellings, and the rifle would have been the 
arbiter between neighbors. But, the storm passed just in 
time to prevent the final catastrophe.* 

He was sent to St. George from Rowlesburg on December 
27, 1862. On the fifth of January he was ordered to fall 
back to Eowlesburg. John Mosby was penetrating the 
country, and it was thought that he was aiming to pick up 
detached squads of men wherever he could find them. 
Faris reached Eowlesburg safely. 

In 1863, a fight occurred in St. George between a detach- 
ment of Jones' cavalry and Snyder's Home Guards. No one 
was hurt, and Snyder retreated after one round.t 

* Joseph A. Faris is now a citizen of Wlieellng, and has established hlmselt a wide 
reputation as a portrait painter. He has, however, painted historical scenes, and 
landscapes. His historical painting, " The Last Battle of the Revolution," or the last 
siege of Fort Henry, is one of the finest In the country. His painting of Hon. A. W. 
Campbell in the Chicago Convention, In 1880, is probably his best. It surely is a mas- 
ter effort. His pictures are numerous, and show a fine artistic touch, which can be 
traced to a mental appreciation of the beautiful in nature and art. The poetical col- 
oring of a scene are depicted by his brush as truly as by Byi-on's pen. As an artist of 
a fine order West Virginia has not his superior. 

t A fuller account of the war would be given in this chapter, but In the Brief Biogra- 
phies it would be repeated, and )t has not been deemed necessary to have it in both 
chapters. Those who wish to see accounts of a personal nature are referred to BrieJ" 
Biographies. 



BBIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 

A. 

Nelson D. Adams was born April 9, 1859, on Cheat Kiver, 
near the old " Pleasant Valley Church," in Preston County, 
TV. Va. His father, G. W, Adams, removed to Limestone 
about the commencement of the Civil War. N. D.'s only 
recollections of the war were seeing his uncle, Samuel 
Martin, return from prison, and of seeing soldiers at his 
father's house. The first school attended was at Limestone 
Church, taught by Eli Adams. The next winter he was sent 
to his grandfather, Philip Martin's, near Kingwood, and 
attended school there. After that, he attended several 
schools at Limestone Church, and two terms at White's, on 
the head of Mill Run. Then he attended four terms at 
Jacob Dumire, Esq.'s, the last of which was taught by L. S. 
Auvil, and the subject of this sketch commenced the study 
of algebra. He was very studious, and devoted every 
minute of his spare time to his books. He lived on a farm, 
and a Tiicker County farmer boy has none too good oppor- 
tunities to become well acquainted with books. But Adams 
was ambitious, and surmounted difficulties and removed 
obstacles, and when the Teachers' Board of Examination 
met at St. George in the fall of 1877, he Avas an applicant 
for a teacher's certificate. As he said: "Entering with 
fear and trembling and coming out all right, I began to 
think that I stood high on the ladder of knoAvledge." 

He taught the school at Limestone Church that winter, 
and in the spring felt encouraged by the cash in his pocket. 
He worked that summer on the farm, and began to compose 



BRIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 349 

poems, wliich betrayed a poetical inclination, not dangerous, 
but perceptible. 

The next fall, 1878, lie thought to strike a higher level, 
and went to Preston to get a school. He passed success- 
fully the examination at Newburg, and shortly afterwards 
set out to hunt himself a school. His success was about 
like Simon Kenton's, who was trying to find Kentucky and 
came to the conclusion that he had passed it in the night. 
He could find no school. Clad in his best jeans coat and 
mounted on a mule, like the Mexican at El Paso Del Mar, 
or Don Quixote in his glory, young Adams wound his way 
over the hills and vales of Preston for a week, taking every 
road but the right one, missing all roads and getting lost, 
and meeting with but cold encouragement. At the end of 
the week he was turning back, somewhat disheartened, 
but still determined, and was planning an attempt in 
some new field, when he had the good fortune to light 
down on a school at New Salem, Union District, Preston 
County. He taught the school successfully, and in the 
spring, 1879, he attended the Portland (Terra Alta) school, 
taught by Professor Fike. He attended this school two 
terms, and in the winter of 1879-80 he taught the Freeland 
school, near Terra Alta. During the summer of 1880 he 
again attended Professor Pike's school and graduated. The 
winter of 1880-81 he taught the Fish Creek school in Pres- 
ton. In the spring of 1881 he was appointed a cadet in 
the West Virginia University, and soon afterwards entered 
that school. He remained there that year. In the winter 
of 1882-83 he taught at Eighty Cut, in Preston County. 
He spent the vacation of 1881 in Ohio, canvassing for books. 
He went again to Ohio in 1882 for the same purpose, and 



350 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

Yisited Lancaster, the scene of M'Cleland and White's ad- 
venture with the Indians. 

Returning from Ohio after two weeks he devoted himself 
to farm work until school opened at the University, when he 
again returned to his books. The year 1884 was also spent 
at the University. 

During his leisure hours he still indulged in verse-making, 
and contributed to the newspapers, the principal of which 
were Tlie Wheeling Intelligencer and The Preston County 
Joimial. He is deeply read in the classics, ancient and 
modern. ^Che Greek, Latin and French he reads in the 
original language. Homer, Herodotus and Cicero are his 
favorites among the ancients ; and among the English he 
shows a preference for Shakespeare, Pope and Byron. Fol- 
lowing are selections from the poetry of Mr. Adams : 

THE DREAMS OF LIFE.* 

We are sucla stuff 
As dreams are made of, and our little life 
Is rounded with a slee^.— Shakespeare. 

From the dawning of life to its last faint gleams, 
Where'ere be the soul it will hask in dreams- 
Sweet dreams of the memory, 

Dreams of futurity, 
Visions ideal to gently veil 
The grim and the real that oft assail. 
They soften the saddest of care and of strife- 
Let Heaven be ijraised for the dreams of life ! 

' Neath the light of the stars in the silent night 
There muses a youth with a glad delight. 
Who fain Avould in reverie 

Fathom Infinity. 
Never a cloud nor a shadow dark 
His hopes can enshroud or his joys can mark. 

*VVrltten for The Preston County Journal. 



BKIEF BIOGEAPHIES. 351 

How well that the future is hidden away ^ 
That the dreamer may dream of a better day ! 

On the banks of a stream in a morn of spring 
A lad and a maiden are wandering 
And dreaming in harmony 

Dreams of felicity 
Glowing and gleaming Avith love divine — 
A halo beaming from heaven's shrine. 
Oh ! ever are angels more happy above 
Than those who are dreaming sweet dreams of love ? 

In the autumn of life 'neath the noonday heat, 
All weary and sad with a life's defeat, 
A man in humility 

Toils with severity. 
Sad is the real, but aye anon 
A beauteous ideal he looks upon — 
He dreams of a land far away where the soul 
Shall rest while the ages eternally roll. 

With a faltering step and with silver hair. 
While listening at eve to an old-time air, 
A man reads in memory 

Lifelong history. 
Dwelling and dreaming on days gone by, 
His spirit is beaming in ecstasy— 
The friends of his boyhood in phantasy come 
To cheer as of yore in the threshold of home ! 

By the banks of a river— by Death's cold stream — 
There lingers a man in whose visions gleam 
In grandest sublimity 

Dreams of Eternity. 
Music is ringing a welcome free 
And angels are singing sweet melody. 
He wakes from the dreams that have cheered him so long — 
A real is gained with th' eternal throng ! 



352 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

GRAFTON NATIONAL CEMETERY.* 

Along the clear Valley so silently flowing 
Its crystal-bright waters 'mid beauty aglow, 
Upon its green bank there are cypresses growing 
And patriots fallen are slumbering low. 
The Stars and the Stripes still above them are flying 
As proudly as o'er them they waved in the fray, 
While softly around them the willows are sighing 
And gentlj^ the breezes in symphony play. 

They're silently sleeping ! nor ever to glory 
Shall bugle tones call them from this their last rest : 
Their conflicts are over ; on battle fields gory 
They fell for that banner so dear to each breast. 
The lightnings may flash and the thunder may rattle, 
They heed them not — resting so free from all pain ; 
The cannon may roar in the storm of the battle. 
But never can wake them to glory again ! 

And over the graves of the silently sleeping, 

While winter and summer incessantly fly ; 

The grave-stones of marble a vigil are keeping 

And marking each spot where the patriots lie. 

There often around them do silently wander 

Those blooming with youth and those drooping with age 

While thoughtfully over the sleepers they ponder, 

Recalling some thought upon memory's page. 

The deeds of some brave are by monuments spoken — 
The battles they fought and the victories won, 
Their titles and ranks and their triumphs unbroken 
And bravery shown 'mid the charge of the gun. 
These monunients crumble, but lasting forever 
Are those that are built by the slumbering brave — 
While cycles are gliding no conflict can sever 
The deeds of tliose dying their country to save. 

Of others are epitaphs only revealing 

The na^nes of the warriors now silent and cold. 



' Written tor The Whcelino InieUigenver. 



BEIEF BIOGEAPHIES. 353 

Their homes and their regiments in memory sealing; 
Their names from the North and the South were enrolled. 
Though laurels of glory may never have crowned them, 
Yet garlands are woven more lasting and bright 
By those that were clinging so tenderly round them 
AVhen bidding farewell as they passed from their sight. 

But many are resting with marble above them 

That tells of no name nor the deeds that were done ; 

No record is shown of the dear ones that loved them, 

But humbly is written the silent "unknown.'' 

Their names are forgotten ! yet loved ones at parting 

So tenderly clung in their final embrace 

While tears in their sorrow and sadness Avere starting — 

What changes of time can svich parting efface ! 

All lonely they're sleeping ! but glad was the waking 
Of bondmen from chains and from slavery's night 
When brightly the morning of Freedoui was breaking 
Resplendent with Liberty's glorious light. 
And long shall the freedmen, relating the story, 
In thankfulness tell of these patriot dead, 
And long shall they cherish the honor and glory 
That hallow the laurels encircling each head. 

Theu' battles are over ! their country in gladness 
Beholds yet her banner in splendor unfurled, 
Unsullied by conilicts, disaster and sadness 
And beaming with radience over the world. 
They died for that banner ! and long shall the Nation 
Enshrine them as victors for truth and for right. 
And long shall she rev'rence the sacred relation 
She bears her preservers of honor and might. 

Then sleep on, ye warriors, so free from all sorrow ; 
Your battles are ended, you've entered your rest ; 
Y^our country shall live through each fleeting to-morrow 
Enjoying the peace which your dying has blest. 
May light from the heavens in beauty descending 
Make hallowed your tombs while the ages shall flee, 

23 o ) 



354 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

And Liberty's rays like the sunlight still blending 
Illumine each heart in this land of the free. 

Then scatter your flowers o'er the graves of the sleeping. 
And tears to these heroes in thankfulness shed ; 
Remember the pledges they gave to your keeping 
And cherish the freedom for which they have bled. 
Blow onward, ye breezes ; as years are advancing 
Play softly through willows that droop o'er their graves ; 
And sweetly, ye birds, with your notes so entrancing 
Keep warbling your songs o'er the slumbering braves. 

Continue, loved banner, in grandeur still flying. 
While breezes thy folds shall unceasingly wave, 
To honor the warrior in cheerfulness dying 
Thy stars and thy stripes so unsidlied to save. 
Flow onward, bright river, your clear waters laving, 
Long murmur so gladly your clear crystal steam ; 
And over, ye forests, in majesty waving. 
Make gentle your music while sweetly they dream. 

THE WINDING RIVER CHEAT. 

Fed by crj'stal flowing fountains 
Rising 'mongthe rugged mountains 

Towering first the sun to greet. 
Flows a rushing winding river 
On whose stream the moonbeams quiver — 

■"Tis the wi]iding River Cheat. 

Hastening toward the mighty ocean 
Ever onward is its motion, 

Sweei)ing like the Stream of Time ; 
And the music of its murnmr 
Wafted by the breeze of sunmier 

Floats o'er many scenes sublime. 

"Neath the winter snows descending 
Massive pines and oaks are bending 

Down to kiss its waters sweet ; 
"Neath the golden sunlight shining 



BEIEF BIOGEAPHIES. 355 

Mirrored landscapes are reclining 
On the -winding River Cheat. 

Listening to its music swelling 
Peace, Content and Love are dwelling 

In this grand old mountain home ; 
To the exile wand'ring, driven, 
Highest earthly boon is given 

Should he here but cease to roam. 

While the spring sweet flowers is bringing, 
Pictures on its waves are clinging — 

Will it show them evermore ? 
And though men are changing ever 
And oft time and distance sever, 

Cheat is flowing as before. 

As along its banks I wander, 
On the checkered scenes I ponder 

Acted in the play of life, 
When the Red Man proud in story 
Sang his songs of war and glory — 

Victor brave in many a strife ; 

When the Pale Face nothing daunted 
First beheld its shores enchanted 

Like the fairy lands of old — 
Men whose daring deeds should ever 
Roll still onv/ard as this river 

To the ages yet untold. 

Other streams may flow more proudly, 
Other scenes be praised more loudly, 

But there's none so dear to me ; 
And the recollections clinging 
Round it, i^leasures will be bringing 

Ever to my memory. 

Be yet in poetic numbers 
Praised its heroes when the slumbers 
Of oblivion veil the fame 



356; HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

That, enwreathed in ivy tender, 
Crowned in days of ancient splendor 
Ajax' and Achilles' name. 

"When the grandeur all is i^erished 
Isis and Osiris cherished 

On the sacred Uiver Nile ; 
When the old Euphrates sweeping 
Midst its ruins as if weeping 

Long forgotten splendor's smile, 

And the yellow Tiber, flowing 

O'er its fields with crimson glowing — 

Stained with War's destructive feet- 
See their legends fast declining, — 
Still ,mid scene's o'er memory twining 

Proudly roll thou winding Cheat. 

Oh, bright crystal murmuring river, 
These historic streams can never 

' Play in measures half so sweet ! 
Other streams in beauteous seeming 
Fade beneath the sunlight beaming 
^ On the winding River Cheat ! 

A FRAGMENT FROM THE "SONG OF THE STUDENT." 

TRANSLATED FROM HOMER. 

With pantaloons threadbare and torn 

And eyelids heavy and red, 

A student sat in unstudently mien 

Cramming his obstinate head. 
Cram ! cram ! cram ! 

In misery, anger and hate, 

But he wrathfully closed his book with a slam 

And mentioned the town of old Yuba Dam 

As he thought of his ill-omened fate. 
Thomas C. Adams, son of Daniel C. Adams, Avas born in 
1842, and married in 1863 to Harriet E., daughter of A. H. 
Bowman, of Rowlesburg. He is a farmer, owning 400 



BEIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 357 

acres, with 140 improved. He lives on the Eowlesburg 
road 8 miles from St. George. Lieutenant McChesney was 
killed within a few rods of his house, and on his farm, and 
the election of June 29, 1861, was held at his house. He 
■was not in the army. His children are, Charles IT., Hannah 
S., Sida M., Adam D., Nora B., Edna E., and Cranmer 
Adams. 

"W. H. AuLT, born in Randolph County, in 1864, the son of 
William Ault, is a farmer and school teacher. He has 
taught in Canaan and at Sapling Ridge, on a No. 2 certifi- 
cate. He lives twenty-five miles from St. George, and has 
been in Tucker since 1866. 

Samuel McClellan Adams, born 1862, son of G. W. and 
brother of N. D. Adams, lives four miles from St. George. 
He attended the district schools, and in 1883 attended in 
Kingwood. He has taught the following schools : White's, 
in Licking district, Sugar Lands, St. George district. Fair- 
view, same, Macadonia, Licking district and No. 15, Union 
district, Preston County. 

M. C. Atherton was born 1824 in New York, married 
in 1859 to Elizabeth Holden. Children : Byron G., Grant 
S. and Laura S. He lives 7 miles from St. George, in Lick- 
ing District. He is a farmer. 

Thomas B. Ashby, was born in Preston County, in 1846, 
son of W. F. Ashby, of Irish, French and German descent. 
Married in 1880 to Martha E., daughter of Levi Lipscomb. 
He is a farmer, owning 220 acres, with 60 acres improved. 
He has been in the county since 1870, and lives two miles 
below St. George. Children: Agnes Ann, Warner E., and 
Stella Hester. 



358 HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

Geoege AV. Adams, son of Daniel C. Adams, and father 
of N. D. Adams, was born in 1836, and is of English, Irish 
and German descent. He was married July 4, 1858, to 
Susan, daughter of Philip Martin, of Preston. In 1874 his 
wife died, and in 1875 he married, Lettie, daughter of 
David Swisher, of Hampshire County, and sister of S. N. 
Swisher, of Tucker County. He farms 160 acres of im- 
proved land, and has 250 acres of wild land, near Limestone, 
4 miles from St. George. He has frequently been road sur- 
veyor and member of the board of education. His children 
are, Nelson D., Samuel M., Melviua J., Philip B., Stella F., 
and Ernest. 

George L. Ashby, of Irish, French and German descent, 
born in 1856 in Preston, is the son of W. F. Ashby : mar- 
ried in 1880 to Charlotte J., daughter of Hilory Griffiith. 
He lives in St. George. Children : Harry Kirk and Maud 
S. G. 

Charles W. Ashby, brother to T. B., and G. L. Ashby, 
was born in Preston, in 1852, and came to Tucker in 1870. 
In 1881 he married Virginia C, daughter of D. K. Dumire. 
His child's name is Rozella. He lives 2 miles below St. 
George, and has 120 acres of land, with 35 acres improved. 
He has been carrying the U. S. mail several years, prin- 
cipally on the route from St. George to Philippi. 

George B. Auvil, son of John Auvil, of English and 
German descent, was born in 1851, and was married, in 
1875, to Malissa, daughter of Margaret White. He is a 
farmer living 2 miles from St. George, on Mill Eun. His 
farm of 150 acres is one-fifth improved. Children : Harvey 
W., Margaret C, Charles T., Carrie Y., and Thomas J. 

William C. Auvil, son of John AutH, was born in 1848 : 
married, in 1870, to Louetta E,, daughter of John White. 



BEIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 359 

Cliildren: Emma Catliarine, George "W., Anna Margaret, 
Frances Melvina, and Pearl W. He is a farmer, but has 
worked some at the stone mason trade. He lives 4 miles 
from St. George, on Mill Run, and his farm of 75 acres has 
30 acres improved. He is a teacher of vocal music, and 
has had some successful schools. 

J. W. Allender, born in 1838, in Hampshire County, is 
is a son of George Allender, now of Randolph County. He 
is of German and English descent. In 1874 he married 
Rebecca Ann, daughter of John R. Goff. Children : Ida 
Catharine, Paden Wade and Mary Eunice. He lives on 
Shafer's Fork, 14 miles from St. George where he owns a 
farm of 96 acres, of which 45 acres is under tillage. He 
has been a resident of Tucker since 18G4. 

William F. Ashby, of English and W^elsh descent, was 
born 1821, in Prestoii County. He is a son of Thonas 
Ashby, and great grandson of a Revolutionary soldier, who 
came to America to fight the Colonies, but deserted to them 
and fought the British. After the war was over, he settled 
near Baltimore, and soon after, moved to the Youghiogheny 
River, where he fought Indians and wild animals until the 
country became settled about him. His son Nathan, grand- 
father of William F,, was a Colonel in the war of 1812. The 
Ashby who figured so prominently as a dashing leader dur- 
ing the civil war, belonged to this famil}^ 

William F. Ashby was married in 1843 to Mary C. W^il- 
helm, of German descent. Children : Mary E., Thomas B., 
AVinfield S., Stephen L., Charles W., Susana E., Samuel L. 
and George. He lives two miles below St. George. 

John J. Adams, sun of Daniel C. Adains, of English and 
Irish descent, was born May 30, 1837, at Limestone. In 



360 HISTOEY OF TUCKEE COUNTY. 

1858 lie married Elegaii, daughter of James J. Goff, of Pres- 
ton County. His wife died in 1863, of spotted fever. From 
tlie 1st to the 19th of April, he saw laid in the grave his 
wife, two children, one lister, his mother, two of his wife's 
sisters and one brother, all having died of the same disease, 
except his mother. At sunset they would be as well as ever, 
and before midnight were no more. 

In his early life, J. J. Adams was a farmer. During the 
war he was a McClellan Democrat. He kept store in St. 
George, and was elected Eecorder (County Clerk), and held 
the office two years ; and at the end of that time was re- 
elected and was also elected clerk of the Circuit Court ; both 
of which offices he has held up to the present time. He 
came to St. George in 1864. September 11, 1865, he married 
Angelica, daughter of William Ewin. Children : Savillia, 
Carrie, Addie, Anna Tilden, Angelica Ewin and Dove. 

T. M. Austin, M. D., born April 26, 1852, in Monongalia 
County, near Laurel Iron Works. His mother was of Irish 
descent, and his father of English. In his younger days, at 
home, he showed an inclination for books, and devoted his 
spare moments to study. Gradually, he fell into the chan- 
nel of medicine and commenced acquainting himself with 
the general principles of the science. He attended the 
schools of his neighborhood, and made progress that was 
more gratifying to other people than to himself ; for, lie 
thought himself getting along slow, because he was not 
studying what lie most wanted to study. When he Avas old 
enough — after he was twenty- one years of age — he entered 
the Physio-Medical College of Cincinnati, and in 1877 he 
graduated. He practiced two years, and also studied under 
Dr. J. B. Scott, of New Salem, Pa. Since then he has 



BKIEF BIOGEAPHIES. 361 

practiced nine years in St. George. In 1883 lie retired from 
the profession in order to get a year or two of rest. His 
practice was harder than he could endure, and his physical 
powers required recreation. In 1878 he was married to 
Mollie S. Auvil, daughter of John Auvil. Strandie is his 
child's name. 

L. S. Auvil/'"' son of John Auvil, was born, in 1853, on 
Pifer Mountain, and lived there eleven years. In 1876 he 
married Anna, daughter of Jacob Dumire, of Limestone. 
His wife died in 1877, and in 1879 he married Minnie Comp- 
ton, of Barbour County. His children's names are. Burton 
"W. and Boyd M. He attended only country schools. The 
teachers to whom he went were Margaret See, Rachel Ka- 
lar, William Hull, Dr. Sawyer, Clark Bowman and Josephine 
Trippett. He has taught eight terms of school, and been 
county superintendent of schools three terms. He has 
been a member of the board of examiners several times. 
When the Tucl'er Democrat was called into existence, he 
took stock in it. He commenced the study of law in 1881 
and was admitted to the bar in 1883. He resides in St. 
George. 

Peter K. Adams, son of William Adams, was Ijorn in 
1862, and married, in 1884, to Sarah, daughter of Jackson 
• Hoy. B}^ occupation he is a farmer, and lives 10 miles from 
St. George, on the head of Mill Eun. 

Samuel M. Adams, born in 1848, is a sou of Daniel C. 
Adams, and was married, in 1868, to Ann Amelia, daughter 
of Daniel Wotring, of Preston. Children : Savillia, John, 
Dora, Elihu, Etta and baby. Farmer by occupation, and 
lives at Limestone, 8 miles from St. George. He owns 130 
acres of land, wdth 20 acres improved. 

• See history of tlie St. George Bar, In this book, for further account of L. S. Auvil. 



3G2 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

Daniel C. Adams, son of Thomas Adams, of Irish and 
English descent, was born 1814. He was born and raised 
and died on the same farm, which is on Limestone, ten 
miles from St. George. In 1835 he married Ruth, daughter 
of Abel Kelly, of Randolph. She died in 18G3. While she 
was lying yery low, and expected to die every hour, Eli 
Adams arrived from Camp Chase, and brought with him the 
spotted fever. His sister took it and died in a few hours. 
John J. and George W. Adams were at the bedside of their 
mother at the time, expecting her to die any hour. John 
Adams' wife and two children took the fever and died. 
Two of his sisters and one of his brothers also died. George 
Adams and his wife took the fever, but recovered. 

Daniel C. Adams was assessor 8 years. A premium of 
$25 had been ofiered by the State to the assessor who 
would send in the neatest and best kept books. The money 
was to be deducted from the salary of the one who sent in 
the worst books. Adams got the premium and the Ran- 
dolph assessor had to pay it. 

Adams was married a second time, in 1863, to Mary A., 
daughter of Philip Martin, of Preston County. She died 
in 1866, and in 18G7 he married Dorcas A. Bonnifield, 
daughter of Dr. A. Bonnifield. Children : George W., 
John J., Thomas C, Samuel M., Margaret, Jemima and 
Maxwell. 

Adams was an influential member of the M. E. Church. 
He died in 1880. 

William M. Adams, born in 1833, is a son of George R. 
Adams, of Irish descent, and was married, in J854, to Mary 
M. Wotring. He owns 787 acres of land, with 235 acres 
improved. He lives 10 miles from St. George, on the head 



BEIEF BIOGEAPHIES. 363 

of Mill Eun. Children: Peter K,, liannali, William F., 
Lntlier L., Sarah J., Daniel J., and Lewis H. 

B 

John Burns, son of William Burns, was born on Jnly 4, 
1849. His ancestry were German and Irish. In 1863, he 
married Sarah A., daughter of Frederick Davis. He lives 
8 miles from St. George, in Licking district, on a farm of 
259 acres, 30 of which is improved. He was constable for 
6 years. His children are, James A., Mary V., Charles W., 
William H., John P., Noah A., and Eliza Agnes. 

Eli Biler, a German, was born in 1822, and w^as married 
1845 to Lyda Susing. He is a farmer of 100 acres, with 40 
acres improved, 9 miles from St. George, on Clover Eun. 
Children : Alpheus, Ephriam, Eobert and Jefferson. 

Alpheus Biler, born 1848, was married 1876 to Mrs. E. 
Clark, daughter of Isaac Phillips. He is a farmer, lives 9 
miles from St. George, has 51 acres of land, 5 acres improv- 
ed, and his children are, John E., Charles Y/., James C. and 

Walter. 

Ephriam Biler was born 1853, married Angeline Limbers 
and lives on Clover Eun ,vvhere he ovrns 2 acres of cleared 
land and has 8 acres still sleeping in the shades of primeval 
forests, 9 miles from the County-seat : children : Mary A., 
Eosa E., Baily N. C. and Johnson M. 

Robert Biler owns 50 acres of land, but does not work 
it : on Clover, 9 miles from St. George. 

Jefferson Biler, born 1863, has no land or trade ; he lives 
on Clover. They are all Eli's bo^'S. 

Seymour Boner, Solomon B's son, was born in 1846, and 
was married, in 1867, to Sophia, daughter of Andrew Fans- 



364 HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

ler. His wife dying in 1868, he married two years later to 
Maliala, daughter of Samuel H. Cosner. He lives 25 miles 
from St. George ; he taught school in Randolph with a No. 
5 certificate, and in Tucker with a No. 3 ; he has killed six 
bears, and is a wonderful bee hunter ; he follows tliem to 
their trees by taking the course of their flight and pursuing 
it. His children are, Stephen A., Oliver H., Sophia B., 
Hattie E., Mary, Antony W. and bab}-. 

W. E. BoNEE, son of "William Boner, v»'as born in 1855, 
of English descent ; married in 1878 to Mary, daughter of 
Marion Hedrick. Children : John and Ei3ie C. A farmer, 
25 miles from St. George, on Dry Fork ; farm contains 75 
acres, 20 acres improved. 

John W. Bonnifield, was born in 1815 in Preston count}', 
son of Thornton Bonnifield. Married in 1877 to Sarah A. 
Baker, daughter of Joseph Baker. He is in the mercantile 
business at Thomas. His child's name is Earl G. 

Alpheus Blanchaed, was born in Maine in 1847. Lives 
5 miles from St. George, on a farm of 8 acres, ^ acre im- 
proved. 

Solomon Boner, was born in Grant County, July 4, 1824, 
and was a son of William Boner, of German and Irish de- 
scent. In 184G he married Jane, daughter of Thomas 
Bright, of Randolph County. His wife died in 1878, and 
the next year he married Sarah J. Vanmeter. Children : 
Seymour, Rebecca. Archibald, Mary, James, Martha, Ann 
Jemima, Yirginia M., Sulpitius G., and Solomon P. He is 
a farmer and civil engineer, living on Dry Fork, 30 miles 
from St. George, where he owns 500 acres of land, one-fiftli 
improved. He was county surve3"or 18 years, and was the 
principal man in locating all the roads above Black Fork. The 
main Dry Fork road was commenced in 1863 and has just 



BKIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 365 

been completed. The first settlers on Dry Fork were 
William Boner,"" Rudolph Shobe, Daniel Poffinbarger, John 
Carr, Thomas White, Ebeuezer Flanagan, t John Wolford.t 
Henry Fausler was the first man to move his family into 
Canaan. He made a small improvement, and left. This 
was about the commencement of the present century ; 
but the exact date cannot be determined. Some think 
it to have been as long ago as 1780. There is cur- 
rent a story that the first settler of Dry Fork went there 
during the Revolutionary War, to escape service in the 
army. But this is not sufficiently well authenticated to be 
accepted as histor3^ However, it is certain that Dry Fork 
was settled at a very early day. Solomon Boner assisted 
in running the line between Tucker and Randolph. He has 
been a great huntrr, and has killed, as he estimates, 50 
bears and 500 deer. He killed a bear on Otter Fork that, 
when dressed, Aveighed 250 pounds, and Archibald Boner 
and James Davis caught one in Abel Long's corn field that 
weighed, neat, 325 pounds. 

James Buckbee was born 1832 in Randolph, married Mi- 
nerva Teter, of Pendleton. Children : Martin K., George 
W., Cora E, and Samuel C: farmer, living in Canaan, 25 
miles from St. George. 

D. J. Bever was born 1829, in Mar3dand, of German de- 
scent. Married 1852 to Esther A. Turner. Children : 
Naomi, Zula, Sarah A., Clarissa, Ida, William S., Isabel and 
Edna Alice D. He is a foreman on the West Virginia and 
Pittsburgh Railway. He was in the Union Army during 
the war, and took part in many of the hottest battles. At 



*GraucTfather of Solomon Boner. 
tGreat-granclfatlier of Jacob G. Flanagan. 
tGrandfatlier of Deputy SheriH Wolfora. 



36G HISTOEY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

Fair Oaks lie went into the tight with 7C0 men and came out 
with less than one-tenth of that number. He w^as in the 
battle of the "Wilderness, and at Appamattox Court-house. 

Martin V. Boner, born 1863, son of W. J. Boner, of Ger- 
man and Irish descent, lives on Dry Fork, 23 miles from 
St. George. 

J. B. Baiu;, of Monongalia, was born 1846, of German 
j)arentage, married 1867 Marj, daughter of Leonard Metz. 
In 1872 his wife died and he married 8usan Eaber. Chil- 
dren : Brice L., Mary E., Charles L. and Jennie. He has 
been in Tucker since 1881, and lives two miles below St, 
George, near the s])ot where Jonathan Minear was killed by 
the Indians. 

Bascom Baker, M. D., was born in Marion County, 1852. 
In his younger days he attended the country schools in his 
neighborhood, and made some progress. "VYhen he became 
a young man, he concluded to go west, which he did. His 
fortune there was, as nearly ever}- young man's is, not as 
good as was hoped. However, he succeeded reasonably 
well. He got to low^a, and there spent some time, mean- 
while attending the Normal Institute at Indianola, that 
State. He soon became satisfied that the West was not the 
best place for him, and accordingly, he returned home and 
taught school for some time, and commenced the study of 
medicine under Dr. Trayhern. "When he had become ac- 
quainted with the rudiments of the science, he entered the 
Baltimore College of Physicians and Surgeons, and gradua- 
ted in March, 1882, when he returned to his practice at 
St. George and the surrounding country. His practice is 
extensive and he possesses the confidence of his customers. 
He was married, in 1883, to Isabel Parsons, of Holly 
Meadows. 



BKIEF BIOGEAPHIES. 367 

As a scholar, lie stands higli in the profession of West 
Virginia. His readings have been extensive, and he has 
ready words to tell what he knows. He takes Huxley and 
Darwin as authority in their departments; and he has be- 
come well acquainted with the works of Tyndall, Stahr, 
Koch and others. 

George F. Bishoff was born at Cranberry Summit, 
Preston County, of German descent ; married, in 1879, to 
Anna E., daughter of John Auvil. Children : Monnie and 
Aloin C. By trade he is a blacksmith, and came to St. 
George in 1878. 

Jacob W. Baughman was born in 1853, in Hardy County ; 
married, in 1876, at Harper's Ferry, to Analiza F. Stalnaker, 
of Barbour County ; is of German descent ; children : Mary 
E., Marvin, Claudius T. and Ernest. He is in the hard- 
ware business at St. George. 

Petek Bohon was born in 1839, in Preston County ; is a 
son of William Bohon, of German descent, and was mar- 
ried, in 18G8, to Emily E., daughter of Van Gofi". By occu- 
, pation he is a farmer, and lives 7 miles below St. George. 
He was in the Union army three years, and lost the use of 
his hand in the service. He was one of the three citizens 
who carried McChesney's body from Hannalisville the 
night after he was killed. Bohon was at St. George at the 
time of Hall's surrender, and in parol was sent to Camp 
Chase. His children are Charles B., Florence B., James, 
Lonzo T., Harr}^ Hayes, John D., Rosy, and Georgia D. 

Mathias Bohon, son of "William Bohon, was born 1834, 
married, 1860, Delia A. Dumire, and after her death he mar- 
ried Sarah J,, daughter of Daniel Gower. Children : Sa- 
rah Jane, Susana C, Dona C, Daniel C.' and Zora Wade. 



368 HISTOEY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

By occupation he is a farmer, mechanic and mill-wright ; he 
lives 3 miles from St. George, on Location Ridge ; he has a 
farm of 172 acres, with one-third improved. For seven or 
eight years he was a member of the board of education, 
and also has held the office of constable : was in the Union 
army, operated along the Potomac, and was taken prisoner 
at Keyser by General Rosser, and remained a captive only 
a few days, when he Avas exchanged. 

James H. Bolyard, of German parentage, was born 1846 
in Preston, Avas married 1868 to Harriet, daughter of Dr. 
John Miller, of Limestone. Children : Ida Rebecca, Anna 
Margaret, Mary Allen, Verlinda Susan and John M.: is a 
farmer of 250 acres, one-fifth improved. Li the Union army 
he had a diversified experience : he was one of those Yan- 
kees whom Ben Wotring and Louis Shaffer captured in 
Cumberland and carried off as prisoners of war. It was a 
most wonderful feat on their part. Bolyard was also cap- 
tured at Keyser by General Imboden ; lay 3 months in jail 
and was then parolled and after two months was exchanged. 
He was in prison^ in Richmond in 1864. After that he was 
sent to Nebraska to guard the mail route against the 
Indians, and had several fights ; was in Dakota, Wyoming, 
Kansas and several other western States. In June, 1866, 
he was discharged. 

MoNTiviLLE BiiiGHT was born in 1850, in Randolph 
County, a son of John Bright, and was married, in 1876, to 
MiUia, daughter of Robert Phillips. Children : Alice May, 
Lihe Belle, and Malissa Ann : lives on Pleasant Run, 13 
miles from St. George, and has 50 acres of improved land 
and 110 acres of wild land. Formerly he was a teamster, 
and is of German and English descent. 





Dr B. Baker. 



George A. Mayer. 





Dr a B Calvert. 



Dr T. M. Austin, 



I 



BRIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 3G9 

Henson R. Bright was born 1847, in Randolpli, son of 
Thomas Bright, of English descent ; married 1871 to Abi- 
gail, daughter of Joab Carr. Children ; Christina, John 
W., Thomas H. and James S.; lives 15 miles from St. 
George, near Shafer's Fork on a farm of 100 acres, one- 
fourth improved. He says that Solomon Townsend was 
the first settler on Pleasant Run. 

John Bright, son of Thomas Bright, was born in Ran- 
dolph County, 1816, of German descent, and was married, 
in 1838 to Lucinda Gainer. Children : Savina, Manda J., 
Harriet E., Montiville, J. Catharine, Alice and Margaret ; is 
a farmer, owning 150 acres of land, one-fifth improved, 13 
miles above St. George ; has been road surveyor, overseer of 
poor and constable. At 19 years of age he was made lieu- 
tenant of militia and held the office seven years. Of many 
a bear fight he has been the hero, and his adventures as 
such ai)proacli very nearly those of John Losh. The first 
snow of the season had fallen, and the dogs treed a bear in 
the thicket on the hillside. "^Che men ran out to see Avliat it 
was, and passed the tree without seeing the beast. No 
sooner had they passed than it thought to slip away, and 
so came sliding down the tree. The dog, that knew better 
than the men did where the bear was, hid Tinder the brush 
and when the brute reached the ground ran up and gnabbed 
it. The bear was scared and bawled, but the dog held on, 
and a terrible fight ensued. The men heard the uproar 
and ran back. They found that the fight was under an old 
tree top and that the bear had the dog down. John Bright 
ran in and pulled the bear out by the hind legs, while 
Thomas Bright stabbed it. It had bit the dog's nose oft*, 
but he got well. 

O. C. Beckxer, born 1837 in Virginia, of Irish descent. 



370 HISTOEY OF TUCKEE COUNTY. 

was inaiTied 1870 to Margaret E., daughter of John E. Goff 
of Black Fork. Children : Kile P., John H., Elnora and 
Dexter Llojd : lives 4 miles from St. George, on "Wolf Enn, 
where he owns a farm of 6Q acres, with 25 acres improved ; 
has been in Tucker since 1868 ; was in the Confederate armj', 
commissar}^ department, under N. H. Bell. 

Thomas J. Biught, born 1820 in Eandolpli, brother of 
John Bright, of German and English descent, was married 
in 1824, to Sarah Schoonover ; is a farmer and lives on 
Pleasant Eun, 15 miles from St. George ; has been in 
Tucker since 1849. Children : Henson E., Virginia M., and 
Mary J. 

Henry Boner, born in 1857, is a son of ^Y. J. Boner, of 
Dry Fork, 25 miles from St. George : owns 37 acres of land 
with 20 acres improved. 

Jesse L. Baughman was born 1860 in Hardy County, and 
worked on a farm until he was thirteen years old, and then 
clerked in a store. Again he engaged in farming, this time 
at Meadowville, Barbour County. In 1883 he came to St. 
George and is a partner with J. Eotli &: Co. in a dry goods 
establishment at Central Exchange, 

Samuel Boner, brother of Hemy Boner, of Dry Fork, 
was born in 1851, married, 1883, to Eebecca E., daughter of 
Perry Eains : child's name is Ida Belle. Owns a farm of 
50 acre and one-half is improved : lives 20 miles from St. 
George. 

John W. BaivEi: was born in Marion County, of English 
descent, ; married in 1866 to Sarah A, E., daughter of Eob- 
ert Johnson. Children : Eobert J,, Alice S., and Fannie B,: 
his farm of 80 acres is on Dry Fork, 12 miles from St. 
George. 



BRIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 371 

John Brimble, born in 1857, of German descent, lives 
12 miles from St. George, on Hog Back. 

Frank J. Blanchard was born in Maine, in 1835, of 
American descent : was raised a farmer, but he soon mani- 
fested a strong inclination for macliinery, and lie turned his 
attention to that channel, and soon became a first-class 
mechanic. When the war broke out, he was drafted, and 
was given ten dsijs in which to appear. When the ten days 
were out, he appeared in Canada. He traveled to a consid- 
erable extent, and was in eleven states within 24 hours ; was 
in the West as far as Iowa, Minnesota and Missouri : was 
married in 1860 to Elizabeth Harrold, of Ireland. His wife 
died and in 1876 he married Emma, daughter of Stephen 
Dumire. Children : John, James, Mary, Edward and 
William. He is a farmer, living five miles from St. George 
on Horse Shoe Run, where he owns 100 acres of land, of 
which 18 is improved. By him was manufactured the first 
sawed shingle ever made in Tucker County, and probably in 
the State. Since then he has sawed over 3,000,000 shingles 
in Tucker County ; and has in his life sawed 4,000,000 feet 
of long lumber, of which 3,000,000 feet was cut on Macom- 
ber's mill. 

John Blanchard, son of Frank J. Blanchard, was born 
in 1863, and deserves a place in history more as a curiosity 
than anything else. He always was a venturesome boy. In 
his early life he lived in Maine. When he was a little older, 
he lived at Middletown, Conn., where he became the best 
swimmer in all the region. When a flood came down the 
Connecticut River, he swam out into the middle of the 
stream and attempted to take a ride on a floating hay stack. 
But it sank with his weight, and his feet sticking fast in the 
hay, he was pulled under the water. This came near end- 



372 HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

ing his adventures forever ; but lie wriggled loose, and got 
to the shore. 

When he was ten or eleven years old, he came to Rowles- 
burg, and soon afterwards to Horse Shoe Run, where he 
became the leader of the boys in all manner of deviltry. 
"When he was fourteen, he ran off from home, and went to 
work for S. N. Swisher, at $3 a month. He- remained at 
this and in the neighborhood until he was seventeen, when 
he made up his mind to go back to Maine and search out 
the home of his ancestors. He collected all the money left 
of his three years' wages, and had $22.00. A ticket from 
Oakland to the point in Maine to which he was going cost 
over $20, and with this small margin, he struck out, with a 
carpet-sack on his back, a pair of overalls on, held on by 
one suspender, and a hat that had years before gone to 
seed. In New York he paid $1.00 for a lunch, and had no 
money left. However, he got to Maine, and chopped cord 
Avood all winter, and in the spring of 1881 returned to West 
Virginia by the way of Boston, Fall River and Long Island. 
He again set to work to earn more money, for his was all 
gone. He Avorked here and there, every once in a while 
taking a wild goose chase through the southern or eastern 
part of the State, and as soon as he got money enough he 
went to Michigan, staid there a few daj^s, returned to 
Tucker, and in two or three weeks went back to Michigan, 
and in a short time returned to Tucker, and as soon as he 
had earned enough money, he Avent back to Michigan. He 
staid there until in the fall of 1883, Avlien he Avent to Cali- 
fornia; staid fifty-nine days, and started back. He got 
caught in the floods Avith Avhicli the coimtry Avas deluged, 
and the cars ran off the track five times before he got 
through to Arizona. He passed through Texas, Indian 



BEIEF BIOGEAPHIES. 373 

Territorj, back to Micliigau, and lias never since been 
heard of. 

Dr, Arnold BoNNiriELD*was born in 1799, August 23 ; is 
a son of Samuel Bonnifield, a soldier of Dunmore's war, and 
the war of the Eevolution. As nearly as can be ascertained, 
his origin is French, through England. In France, the 
name was spelled Bonnifant, or Bonnifelt, and has reached 
its present spelling through the English. Dr. Bonnifield's 
mother was of purely English descent, belonging to the 
James family. He was married to Elizabeth, daughter of 
David, sister to Enoch and granddaughter of John Miuear, 
the founder of St. George. Their children are, Katharine, 
who married David Swisher, of Hampshire, Samuel, who 
died of consumption when a young man, Dorcas, who mar- 
ried, Daniel C Adams, of Limestone, Sarah J., who married 
Eufus Maxwell, Abe, the only one now unmarried, Lettie, 
the wife of S. H. Smith, sheriff of Grant County, David, 
who was drowned at Willow Point, in Cheat Eiver, April 30, 
1871, Allen H., the traveler, who married Jane, daughter of 
A. B. Parsons of California, and John, who died young. 

Dr. Bonnifield has always been a farmer ; but, in addition, 
he has paid some attention to the practice of medicine. He 
was a slaveholder, but never sympathized with the institu- 
tion of slavery. He was the first clerk of the Circuit and 
County courts of Tucker, and was Justice of the Peace for 
thirty years. 

David Bonnifield, a son of Dr. Bonnifield, was drowned 
in Cheat. He had married Margaret Hessler, of Germany. 
His children are, Mary, Anna M., Katharine F., John E., 
Samuel A. and Margaret. They live at Beloit, Kansas. 

*As Dr. Bonnlfleld receives notice at length in anotiier part of tliis book, it is not re- 
garded necessary to give full biograpliy liere. 



374 HISTOKY OF TUCKEK COUNTY. 

David B. was a farmer and dealer in cattle. Being a 
sj'mpatliizer with the South in the War, he was much har- 
assed by the opposing side. A large drove of cattle were 
carried off, which embarrassed him financially. Soon after, 
he was arrested and taken to Fort Delaware for incarcera- 
tion. His suffering there was little less than the worst 
specimens of Andersonville, Libby or Rock Island. When 
at last he made his escape, his health was wrecked, and his 
property was gone. From that time until his death, he 
lived on Horse Shoe Ptun, four miles from St. George. 

xVllen H. Bonnifield,* son of Dr. Bonnifield, was born 
1845. Before he was of age, he left home and started over- 
land for California. When he reached Iowa he learned that 
the Indians were hostile, and that it would be unsafe to ven- 
ture out. Then Iib turned back to New York, took a steamer 
and reached San Francisco by the way of Panama. He re- 
mained four years on the Pacific Coast, and then returned 
home. Since then he has been a farmer on the old home- 
stead of 700 acres — including wild lands — four miles from St. 
George, on Horse Shoe Run. In 1875 he married Jane, 
daughter of A. B. Parsons. His children are, Edna F., Ber- 
tie M., Jennie S., Anna D., and Luke G. 

Abe BonnifieldI', son of Dr. Bonnifield, was born in 1837. 
He traveled extensively over the west and over British 
America. When the war came on he joined the Rebel 
army, and fought to the end of the war, never surrendering, 
but dodging Mdien the troops to which he belonged were 
dispersed, and coming home with his sword strapped on his 



* Notice tx) some length of A. H Bonnifield having been given In a former part of this 
hook, a full blognipliy is not given here. 

+ The principal events In Abe Bonnltleld's biography having been given elsewhere In 
this book, only a bilcf mention Is here made. 



BRIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 375 

side. His weight is seventy pounds, and his height three 
feet. 

He was at Lynchburg when Jubal A. Early defeated 
Crook and Hunter; he was at McDowell when Jackson 
routed Milroy; he suffered defeat at New Hope, when 
Hunter scattered Breckenridge's troops; he was with Im- 
boden in Hampshire, and saw him blow up the armored 
gondolas which the Federals sent down the railroad; was 
at the battle of Frederick City, Md., and witnessed the 
whole transaction ; took part in Early's raid on Washing- 
ton, and fought nearly all the time for three weeks. At 
Crab Bottom he was taken prisoner, but escaped in less 
than two hours." 

Samuel W. Bowman, son of Adam Bowmam, born in 1820, 
three miles below St. George ; was a farmer in his earlier 
years, and worked hard on his father's land. In his twenty- 
third year he was married to Elizabeth Minear, Children : 
Virginia C, Lavina S., Charles L., and John C. For four 
years he was deputy sheriff and was sheriff' four years, both 
of which positions he filled honorably and with ability. 
For many years he was postmaster at St. George, and was 
for twelve years a contractor for carrying the U. S. mails, 
principally from St. George to Rowlesburg and return. 
He was a merchant for fifteen years, and in the meantime 
built the Black "Water House in St. George, the largest 
hotel in the county. 

During the war, Mr. Bowman was a sympathizer with the 
South, although he saw best not to enter the arm3^ Nev- 
ertheless he was considerably annoyed by the Union sol- 
diers at difterent times, but was never seriously interfered 

*Abe Bonnifleld has in manuscript a l)log:i'apliy of himself, partly written by him- 
seU and partly toy Prof. G. E. Selby. 



370 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

Avitli : lias always been a Democrat and an influential man 
in the politics of the county. 

Charles L. Bowman, son of Samuel W. Bowman, was 
born at St. George, Aug. 12, 1847 : is of English and Ger- 
man descent : lived in St. George imtil he was a man, and 
spent his time working some and clerking in his father's 
store. Finally he arrived at the conclusion that it Avas de- 
creed that he should go to the West. He went, and had a 
bitter experience of it ; got sick and received the treatment 
which sick people are apt to get on the frontiers unless they 
fall into unusual hands. Bowman had a long siege of the 
fever, and did not know and cared little whether he woidd 
get well or not. But finally he recovered, and came troop- 
ing back home, more contented to try his fortune in Tucker. 
He settled down to business, and in 1874 married Miss 
Susie D. Gray, of Lancaster, Ohio. Children : Jesse Clif- 
ton and baby. 

Four years after marriage, he started the Tvcl'er County 
Pioneer. Previous to that, he had run a job press to some 
extent. He remained in the newspaper business nearly six 
3^ears, when he quit it and turned his attention to merchan- 
dizing. He now owns the store formerly owned by his 
father at St. George. 

c 

JoAB Cam!, a German, son of John Carr, was born in 
1823 ; married in 184G to Lucretia, daughter of Thomas 
Bright. He farms 90 acres and has 110 acres of wild land, 
on Dry Fork, 24 miles from St. George. He taught one 
school and killed 12 bears, and belonged to the Home 
Guards. Children: Clorinda, Abbie, Enos G., Margaret, 
Daniel A. D., Josei)li D., Joab, George B. McClellan, 
Phoebe E., Virginia and Archibald S. 



BEIEF BIOGEAPHIES. 377 

Joseph A. Caee, son of Joab, was born in 1865 ; married 
Elizabeth Carr, and lives on Dry Fork, 25 miles from St. 
George. He has one child, Flora. He is a farmer, owning 
90 acres of wild land and 10 acres of tilled. 

James B. Caee, son of Solomon Carr, born 1828 in Kan- 
dolph. Married in 1853 to Jemima, daughter of Thomas 
Bright. Farmer, owning 175 acres of land on Dry Fork, 
20 miles from St. George. He was in the Home Guards two 
years. Children : Adam H., Enoch, James W., Margaret, 
Phoebe C, Elizabeth and Alice. 

Enoch Caee, son of James B. Carr, was born in 1858, 
lives 20 miles from St. George, on a farm of 170 acres, 30 
acres of which is improved. 

Maeion H. Caee, son of Solomon Carr, was born in 1840, 
in Randolph county. Married ISGi to Julia Carr. He is a 
farmer, living on Dr}' Fork, 20 miles from St. George. He 
"was in the Home Guards one year. Children : Marion B., 
George and James H. 

Solomon W. Cosnee. One of the most widely known men 
of Tucker County is Solomon W. Cosner, the Pioneer of 
Canaan. He was born in 1826, in Haidy County, and is a 
son of Henry Cosner, and of German descent. In 1849 he 
married Catharine Shell, daughter of Philip Shell, of Hardy 
County. His Children are : H. Harrison, Armida J., C. 
Columbus, Elizabeth Ann, Emil, Freylinghuysen, Comodore 
Porter, U. S. Grant, Abraham Lincoln and Stephen A. Doug- 
lass. He owns 850 acres of land in Canaan, 400 acres of 
■which is cleared and in grass. He also owns 625 acres on 
Shafer's Fork. He has a grist mill on his Canaan property. 
He lives 25 miles fi-om St. George, and has been in Canaan 
since 1864. He is extensively known as the first settler in 



378 HISTOEY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

tliat region. His house has long been the stopping place 
of hunters, adventurers and idlers from the Eastern and 
Northern cities, who go into Canaan to spend the heated 
months of summer. 

When he went into Canaan, in 18G-i, there was no one 
living in that region. But there was an ancient improve- 
ment, 80 or 90 years old, made by some one whose memory 
only remains, but who is supjjosed to have been an ancestor 
of S. C. Harness. Cosner left Grant County, then Hardy, 
and cut a path for 20 miles across the Alleghany Mountains, 
14 miles from his present home. He carried all his goods 
and plunder on horseback. When he reached Canaan, he 
found it a wild country filled with cattle, horses and stock 
that had been run in there by thieves during the war. 
He commenced an improvement near one of the most beau- 
tiful springs in West Virginia. It was almost out of the 
world. The nearest stores were at St. George and Mays- 
ville, each 25 miles distant, and from one or the other of 
these places he had to carry his groceries. 

It was five or six years before any other family moved 
into that region. The first man to move into Canaan after 
Cosner was John Nine, of Preston County. He settled on 
a farm adjoining Cosner's; and the next to come were 
James and Isaac Freeland, also from Preston. Much of 
the bread of Canaan's early settlers had to be lugged from 
settlements fifteen and twenty miles distant. The land 
produces average crops of grain, and does remarkably well 
with buckwheat. Potatoes and all vegetables that groAV in 
the ground as potatoes, beets, radishes and onions, grow to 
perfection. The country, when covered with original for- 
ests, is swampy, but, as soon as the timber is removed, the 
water dries up. The soil is of a dense clay, and water 



BRIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 379 

stands in horse tracks in the woods. Fern is a nuisance to 
deal with. Fire kills it, and the timber also, when it be- 
comes dry enough to burn. Grass grows splendidly as soon 
as the timber is removed. 

Cosner was in the war, but liis record is not of special 
interest, inasmuch as he was not in any particular engage- 
ments of note. His principal record, aside from being the 
pioneer of Canaan, is that of a bear hunter. He and his 
boys have killed over half a thousand bears in Caiiaan, in- 
numerable deer, tw^o panthers and one wolf, according to 
their account. He has had many narrow escapes, which, if 
collected, would more than rival those of Finley. As a 
sample of his exploits, and also as a sample of his style of 
narrative, we append a story of his, taken down in writing 
as it was told, by a visitor who knew something of short 
hand writing. The story runneth thus : 

I got up at midnight and went out in the woods with a dog, gun, 
and a big trap "hunkered"' to my back. Soon the dog roared, 
down the hill like the d— 1 Ijreaking tan-bark, and I said to myself : 
"that's a bear." I ran after him, and soon came to where the dog 
had treed two bear-whelps. I was skirmishing around to shoot 
them, when an old bear, in a bunch of laurel, five or six feet away, 
"liooved " up on his hind feet, and made for me. I tried to shoot, 
but gun failed. I got out a cap to put on the gun. Just then the 
bear lunged at me, and I had to jump six or seven feet high to 
keep from getting gnabbed. The bear kept snapping at my feet, 
and I ran behind a tree to hide. The bear followed me, and I kept 
running round and round until I got dizzy. The bear probably 
got dizzy too, and quit running and stopped to study how to get 
me. It popped its head round one side and then the other of the 
tree and tried to scare me so that I would jump out. But, I 
laughed at it and it seemed to get madder. All at once it slung its 
paws round and tore my pants off. This made me mad, and I 
leaped out and pounded the old beast with my gun, and had a 
fearful fight. I was getting tired and wanted to quit, and 



380 HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

just then my dog snapped the bear and it turned on the dog. 
I thought to myself, "Now's my time to take a tree," and I ran 
to a burnt chestnut snag and tried to cHmb it ; but it was too shck 
and I shpped back faster than I could climb. I saw that I could 
not climb that tree and was looking for another, when the bear 
came bulging through the brush after me, and I went up that slip- 
pery snag in a hurry. As I went up, the bear came after me with 
renewed energy and seized my foot, and tore my shoe off. I scram- 
bled to the top of the snag and sat down on it. The bear was 
trying to climb too. It pawed and scraped and bawled and roared, 
and made the mountains ring. It Avas the ugliest bear I ever saw. 
It kept me up that tree until I got awful tired, and wished that I 
had staid at home. I nearly froze. The wind whistled against me, 
and I said to myself, "O, if I only had my pants!" The bear sat 
down and took times easy, and I tried to scare it off by hitting it 
wdth pieces of bark and rotten wood. 

It got daylight, and the sun came up and got warm, and I felt 
better, but was tired and numb, and the bear seemed to know it. 
I sat there in despair all day. It was the longest day that ever I 
pulled through. About sundown one of the young bears com- 
menced coming down. This was balm and Gilead to my weary 
back, for I knew that the old one would leave as soon as the young 
whelps would come down. I watched it patiently and kept as still 
as I could. It would slide down a foot or two, and then stop a 
while to study about it, and to look around to see if everything 
was all right. Then it would drop down a few inches further, and 
would go through the same maneuvers. It got dark and the moon 
came up, and that little whelp was not half way down. I was try- 
ing to be patient. Job might have been a patient old citizen, but 
he never sat on top of an old snag twenty-four hours with no pants 
on. Eternity could be no longer than it took that young bear to 
reach the ground. I wished that an earthquake would come and 
shake him off. But, at last he got to the ground, and the old beast 
started to go away, walking sidewise and looking up viciously at 
lue. When I got down, I was so stiff I could hardly hobble home. 
I have had thousands of battles with bears, and have stabbed them 
to death and pounded them to death and kicked them to death; 
but this scrape made me feel the sneakingest that ever I felt. 



• BBIEF BIOGEAPHIES. 381 

Solomon Cosner is a man of giant frame, weighing about 
200 pounds, and standing 6 feet tall. In liis earlier days lie 
was probably the most powerful man in Tucker County. 

F. H. Cosner, son of Solomon Cosner, born 1861, in 
Hardy County, married, in 1882, to Elizabeth, daughter of 
John Sears. His only child is Olive E. His farm is in 
Canaan, 30 miles from St. George, contains 66 acres and 
has 10 acres under cultivation. 

C. P. CosNEK, brother to F. H., born 1863, in Hardy 
County, lives with his father in Canaan. 

W. H. H. Cosner, another son of S. W. Cosner, born 
1849, married 1875 to Melissa J., daughter of John Nine. 
His wife died in 1881 and he married her sister, Margaret 
E. Nine. Children are. Harness F., Ada Bell and Lyda 
Ann. He owns a farm of 100 acres, one-half improved, in 
Canaan, 30 miles from St. George. In his time, he says, 
he has killed 30 bears and 300 deer. 

C. C. Cosner, born 1853, in Lewis County; married in 
1880, to Mary J., daughter of John Sears, of Grant County. 
Children : Gilbert E., and Lilly Estella. He has been in 
Tucker since 1864 ; and he owns a farm of 90 acres, 30 acres 
improved, in Canaan, 30 miles from St. George. , 

Emil Cosner, son of Solomon Cosner, born 1859 ; married 
in 1880 to Lydia A., daughter of Gustavus Muntzing, of 
Grant County. Farmer, 83 acres, 40 acres improved, 30 
miles from St. George, in Canaan. Children : Ora G. and 
Ida Anice. 

Felix H. Collins, was born in 1852, lives on rented land, 
on Red Creek, 25 miles from St. George. 

Henry Cook, born in Maryland, in 1842, of German and 
Irish descent. Married Miss Lyda A. Spencer in 1864. 



382 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. . 

Children : Mary Kate, Emma, Ida G., Thomas W., Robert 
R., Harriet A., Clementine and Harry O. He lives at 
Thomas, and has been mining for 20 years. 

Samuel CoorER, was born in 1826, in Grant Connty, 
married in 18-i9 to Elizabeth Wymer, of Pendleton County. 
He OAvns 413 acres of land on Red Creek, 25 miles from St. 
George ; he has 180 acres of improved land ; he has been 
in Tucker since 1874. Children: Mary, Martha, John W., 
Job, Maliala, Melviua, Daniel, Elizabeth, Melissa Jane, 
Adam, Rosetta and Abraham. 

JoAB A. Caeh, whose father's name was Abner, was born 
in 1844, in Randolph County, and was married in 1865 to 
Sarah C, daughter of Joseph White, and is of English and 
Irish descent. Children: Yirginia C, Albert, Sjdvester J., 
James B., Sarah E., Mary A.. Alpheus, Arthur A. and 
Mollie. He lives on a farm of 93 acres, with one -third of 
it improved, on Red Creek, 30 miles from St. George ; he 
was in the Confederate army a few mouths and in the 
Union Home Guards. 

Heney Cooper was born in 1833, in Frederick County, 
Va., of English and German descent ; married in 1867 to 
Mary M., daughter of George Randolph, of Hampshire 
County. Children : Charles H., George F., Anna M., John 
Robert, Mary Catharine, William S., Frederick A., and 
Hattie May. He lives in Canaan, 33 miles from St. George. 
He owns 1,400 acres of land, of which 110 acres is im- 
proved ; has been in Tucker County since 1882 ; He was a 
scout for Lee in the Confederate army. 

Thomas Capji was born in 1857, son of John Carr ; married 
in 1877 to Elizabeth Pendleton ; lives on Dry Fork, 23 miles 



BEIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 383 

from St. George; a farmer and owns 60 acres of land, 6 
acres improved. Children ; Martin, Ursula and EUen. 

jAiMES L. CourviCK v.-as born in 1861 ; lives at Fairfax. 

James Gloss, of Scotch descent, was born in 1851 ; married 
in 1873 to Margaret Y., daughter of Thomas M. Mason ; 
lives on the railroad, 14 miles from St. George. Children : 
Duncan McClure, Charley Ross and Anna Belle. 

William M. Cayton, editor of the Tucker Democrat, was 
born in 1862, in Upshur County, came to St. George in 
1881 : is a printer by trade. For further sketch see the 
history of the Pioneer and Democrat, in this book. 

TV. E. Cupp, born in Virginia 1856 ; married, 1882, to 
Mary J., daughter of C. "W. Mayer, of Terra Alta; attended 
school at New Haven, and commenced clerking when he 
was 16 years of age. He resides in St. George, and is in 
the mercantile business in the firm of Mayer & Cupp. 

A. E. Calveet, M. D., of Guysville, Ohio, a few miles 
west of Parkersburg, was born in 1862. In his earlier 3-ears 
he attended school near home, and put in his time to good 
advantage. When he was twenty years old, that is, in 1882, 
he entered P. M. College at Indianapolis, Ind. At college 
he was noted for his devotion to his books and to hard 
study. He was a ready writer, and generally- had a book 
well nigh reproduced in notes by the time he was through 
with it. In 1884 he graduated with honors, after having de- 
voted two 3-ears of intense application to his studies. From 
college he returned home, and after a short visit proceeded 
to St. George and took up the practice that Dr. Austin had 
resigned. As a doctor, he has been eminently successful, 
-and his support is of that kind that will endure. 



384 HISTOEY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

John W. Cass^vdy, born 1856 ; married in 187G to Eliza- 
betli James, daughter of Epliraim James. Five acres of his 
53 are improved, 3 miles from St. George, on the head of 
Dry Run. Children : George Harvey and Thomas Q. 

D. M. CoRRiCK, son of William Corrick, was born in 1830, 
of German descent ; married in 1855 to Louisa Turner, of 
Lewis County. Children: Pasthena, James L., Mar}^ 
Georgiana and Virginia. In 1867 his wife died at Newburg, 
where he then lived, and he married Charlotte Stone. He 
lives 8 miles above St. George on the river, where he o^vns a 
farm of 99 acres, with 40 acres improved. 

Seymour Carr lives in Dry Fork. 

Marsh.\ll Campfield was born 1841 in Randolph, and 
married in 1865 to Lucina J. Day. Their children are: 
Lyda Grant, Jesse Colfax, Albert Isaac, George A., John R., 
Hanning F., Martha Luvenia, and Noah P. He is a farmer 
living fifteen miles above St. George on a farm of 300 acres, 
one-fifth of which is improved. He was in the Union army 
three years and was wounded in the arm hj a Minie-ball. 

WiLLLor Corrick, Avas born in 1800, in Randolph County, 
and died in 1882 ; son of John Corrick, of German descent, 
was married in 1825 to Daborah Martney, of Randolph 
County. Their children are: Washington, Jefferson M., 
Eunice, Daniel M., Martha Jane, John, Francis M., Jetson, 
Baxter, Elizabeth Ann, Mary Lucretia, Anzina, Eda, Adam, 
Dow, Joseph, David and Elias. His farm of 620 acres had 
100 acres of improved land on it ; he held several offices in 
the early histor}^ of the county. The battle of Corrick's 
Ford was named from him. The word is nearly always 
wrongly spelled. It should be C(>rrick not C^a-iick. His 
house was made a hospital for the sick and wounded. 



BKIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 385 

The kitchen was a prison for the captured Confederates. 
Everything on the farm that conld be eaten was gone, ex- 
cept a few potatoes in a barrel in the garret, and one old 
goose. It was Corrick's account that three Union and 
twelve Confederates were killed. 

S. M. Callihan was born in 1844, in Harrison County, of 
Irish descent ; married in 1870 to Virginia, daughter of 
Jacob H. Long. Their children are, Cora M., Otho C, and 
Stanford J. S. M. Callihan came to Tucker County, in 
1867, to build E. Harper's house, being a carpenter by trade 
and having the contract of building it. After that, he went 
into the merchant business at Holly Meadows, 6 miles from 
St. George, and subsequently bought 90 acres of improved 
land on the river bottom at the finest part of the Holly 
Meadows. He died in 1884. He was a man of strictest 
honesty, and people placed in him the most unbounded 
confidence. He had been Justice four years, county com- 
missioner one term, and president of the county court one 
term. He was just fairly entering upon a life of usefulness, 
when, at the age of 40, he was suddenly taken off. His loss 
was felt throughout the county, and our neighboring coun- 
ties joined together to extend to us their sympathy for our 
loss. 

He was a man who never was neutral on anything. He 
had an opinion on every subject that claimed his at- 
tention. In the war, his sympathies and support were 
given to the South. He entered the army and was under 
Stonewall Jackson until the General's death. He was 
soon afterward taken prisoner in Highland County, Ya., 
and was sent west. At Grafton he made his escape by 
jumping from the train. He went east and was soon retaken 



386 HISTOEY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

and sent to Camp Chase, where he lay a -whole year, and 
was then sent to Fort Delaware. His suflferings were as all 
prisoners sujffered who were confined in those bastiles. 

J. R. CoLLETT was born in 1860, son of H. P. Collett, of 
Scotch descent, married in 1883 to Nora M., daughter of 
Garrett Long. Their child's name is Manry. He is a 
mechanic and lives at Alum Hill. 

L. D. CoKEiCK, son of William Corrick, was born in 1845, 
at Corrick's Ford, married in 1874 to Mary J. Messenger. 
Children: Walter J., Adam J., Otis E., and Ollie B. He is 
a farmer, owning 250 acres of land, with 100 acres im- 
proved. 

William Chajs^nel was born in Randolph County, in 1855, 
of English, Irish and German descent, married in 1875 to 
Martha E,, daughter of Adam Dumire. Their children are : 
Albert Tilden, Icy Margaret, and Edwin. He lives at the 
mouth of Wolf Run, 3 miles from St. George, where is his 
farm of 88 acres, with 8 acres improved. 

Philip Constable was born in 1835, in Preston County, 
of English descent, married in 1859 to Catharine, daughter 
of William Calvert ; he is a farmer, living 9 miles from St. 
George on Shafer's Fork, where he owns 63 acres of land, 
one-half improved. And has worked to some extent in the 
shook and lumber business. 

Sylvester Channel was born in 1843, of English and 
Irish descent, was married in 1867 to Marsilla, daughter of 
James R. Parsons. Their children are: Robert W., Irwin, 
Emma Susan, Mahala, Harriet and Rachel E.; his farm of 
92 acres, one-fourth improved, is on Shafer's Fork, 15 
miles from St. George. He was in the Union Ai*my. 



BEIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 387 

G. L. Cardee, not a citizen of Tucker, but a preacher 
traveling here in 1884, was born in Harrison County, in 
1850. In 1872 he married Martha Fitzhugh : his child's 
name is Howard. He has been preaching the doctrine of 
the Methodist Protestant Church four years. 

Alexander B. Closs, son of David Closs, born 1856, was 
married in 1882 to Catharine, daughter of Jacob Dumire, of 
Limestone; his children are, Lizzie Bell and James; he is a 
farmer, living on Horse Shoe Eun, 7 miles from St. George, 
on the old Stephen Losh farm, one of the oldest plantations 
on the Bun ; he also is partner in a shingle-mill and saw-mill. 

David Closs was born 1823 at Ayrshire, Scotland, where 
he lived until he was a man. At the age of twenty-four he 
married Agnes Furguson, in the city of Glasgow. He was a 
miner by trade. Soon after his marriage he came to 
America, and worked three years in the Maryland mines 
about Lonaconing and New Creek. In September, 1850, he 
came to Horse Shoe Eun, and moved into John Stephenson's 
loom house, near where J. H. Fansler now lives, and re- 
mained there about ten days until he could build himself a 
house. When it was done, he moved into it. It stood two 
or three hundred yards from the present Pine Grove School- 
house. He lived there about three years, and then 
moved up on the mountain, which from him is now called 
" Closs Mountain." His experience in farming was enough 
to discourage almost anybody else. He planted three acres 
of corn and got only six bushels of ears ; sowed three acres 
of oats, and hauled it all home, straw and all, on a one- 
horse sled ; went to the Glades and bought potatoes at 81^ 
cents a bushel, carried them home on horseback and planted 
them, but never dug them. The only thing raised that was 



388 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

worth anytliiug was a little buckwheat and rye. He went 
back to work in the mines to get a little money to try it 
over again. His fortune began to grow better. When he 
got on top of the mountain he raised enough to do him a 
year ; or rather his wife raised it while he was working on 
the Glover Gap Tunnel, on the railroad to Wheeling. 

While clearing his land on the mountain, the first year, 
he waded through snow knee deep, and when he would eat 
dinner, which he had carried with him, he was often 
obliged to keep walking while eating to keep from freezing 
his feet. In 1864 he worked two months in the mines. It 
was war times and wages were high. In one month he 
made $157.43. 

He has been a hard-working man all his life. Although 
he lived in the woods, yet he never killed a bear or a deer. 
As he expressed it : "I did all my hunting with the ax and 
grubbing hoe, and I expect I am as well off as if I had trot- 
ted over the mountains all n\j life with a gun." And he is. 
He has cleared from the woods a fine farm of 225 acres, and 
has besides 378 acres of wild lands. He has given good 
farms to his children, and he has the satisfaction of seeing 
them all industrious and respected citizens, honest and well- 
to-do. He has plent}^ left to last him his lifetime, and he 
can spend the remainder of his days in ease. His life and 
what he has done are samples of what perseverance and in- 
dustry will do, even in the rough mountains of Tucker. 
There are many localities better than the one which David 
Closs selected, and any man with health and strength might 
do as well as he. The great trouble is that there is not 
enough energy among our people. There is a wide field to 
work in, and, although there are few opportunities for 
amassing fortunes, yet there is room for every one to make 



BEIEF BIOGKAPHIES. 389 

a good Imng, liave plenty to eat and wear, and get along 
well in the world. 

His children are : William, John, James, Margaret, Alex- 
ander, Sarah, Isabel and Duncan. John lives in Maryland, 
near Oakland. 

David Closs is known the neighborhood over for his hos- 
pitality. No one in need was ever turned from his door un- 
cared for. No one, really suffering, ever asked him in vain 
for a favor. He is a steadfast member of the M. P. Church. 

Benjamin Clark was born at Fort Pendleton, Md., 
(near Grant County, W. Va.) in 1853, son of John Clark, of 
Irish and German descent ; came to Tucker in 1865. He 
lives at Leadmine, 10 miles from St. George ; is a farmer and 
is a partner in 110 acres of land, partly improved. 

Martin V. Canan born 1844, in Hampshire County ; mar- 
ried, 1865, to Catharine Martin, of Mineral County. Chil- 
dren : Fred, Lewis, William N., Augustus M., EHzabeth Ann, 
Mary T., Eosa E. and Thomas U. Garfield ; is a farmer, liv- 
ing on the upper waters of Horse Shoe Run ; he was in the 
Union army and was stationed at different places along the 
Potomac, but was not in much fighting. He came near 
freezing to death while in the army. 

Enos G. Care, born 1850, son of Jacob Carr, married in 
1872 to Augeliue Carr. The children are, Mary Francis, 
Thomas H. M., James B., Henry S., Ella Y. and Amos G. 
He owns 310 acres of land on Dry Fork, 21 miles from St. 
George, 125 acres of which is improved. 

Sylvester Carr, born 1858, son of Sylvester Carr, mar- 
ried in 1876 to Martha E. Goldessen, of Grant County. 
Children : Henry and Sylvenas. By occupation he is a 
farmer and lives 30 miles from St. Geor»e. 



390 HISTOKY OF TUCKEE COUNTY. 

Fisher Carii Avas born in 1864, brother of Sylvester Carr ; 
married in 1883 to Alice Carr. They have one child, named 
Wilford C. 

George W. Cross, born 1855, in Barbour County. His 
children are Flavius B., Flora A. and Ida May ; he lives on 
Clover Kun. 

Hugh P. Collett, born 1825, in Beverly ; is of French 
and English descent ; married in 1855, to Louisa, daughter 
of John E. Goff. By trade he is a carpenter, but owns 200 
acres of land, one-forth improved, on Black Fork, 10 miles 
from St. George. Children — Florence E., Pleasant O., John 
E., Jefferson D,, Perry L., Sophronia, Lycurgus, Tazewell, 
Chesy Lyon, Homer, Lettie and Clinton M. 

John C. Cline, born 1830, in Harrison County ; is of L-ish 
descent ; he was married in 1855 to Margaret, daughter of 
Aaron Loughry. Children — Samuel N., Charles W., Miner- 
va J., Serena and George. He owns 299 acres of land with 
50 acres improved, 10 miles from St. George ; was in the 
Union army 7 months, under Kelly. 

D. 

Frederick Davis, son of John Davis, born 1814, in Ohio ; 
was married in 1861 to Mary A., daughter of John Eobin- 
son. He lives 8 miles from St. George, on rented land, in 
Licking District. His children are, Charles, Frank and 
Malissa. 

Charles Davis, son of Frederick, was bom in 1868. Far- 
mer of 110 acres, 25 acres improved; lives on Licking, 8 
miles from St. George. 

William A. Duling, born 1852, in Mineral County, of 
German descent, is doing business in the firm of Shilling- 
burg <fc Duling, at Fairfax. 



BEIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 391 

Olivek Dumire, born 1855, is a son of Stephen Dumire, 
and was married, in 1880, to Sophia A. Lansberry. He is 
of German descent and follows farming principally. Chil- 
dren : Agretta, Elizabeth, and Abraham Orvis. He has 
lived awhile in Pennsylvania ; but he now resides on Horse 
Shoe Eun. 

William Dumire, born 1833, is a son of Charles Dumire, 
and was married, in 1863, to Rebecca, daughter of Jacob 
Pifer. In 1875 his wife died, and he married Mary Hibb. 
Children : James M., Lucinda R., Mary Ann, Ruth J., Vir- 
ginia P., John L., and William E. He lives 6 miles from 
St. George, on Mill Run, and has a farm of 48 acres. He 
was in the Union army, under General Kelh'-, and had his 
ankle injured in the service. 

James E. DeMoss, son of W. W. DeMoss, was bom in 
1849 in Gilmer County, W. Va., married in 1866, to Mary 
M. Norman, of Doddridge County, W. Ya. Their children 
are Darul and Clarinda. He came to Tucker in 1882 ; he 
was in the Union army two years ; part of the time under 
General Harris, and was in the battle of Cedar Creek, 
Cross Roads and Bull Town; owns a farm of 34 acres, 8 
miles from St. George on Brushy Fork. 

Daniel K. Dumire was born in 1831 ; is of German de- 
scent, and the history of his ancestors is found in another 
chapter of this book ; was raised on Mill Run, near St. 
George. When 21 years of age, he married Sarah Ann 
Sell. On his wedding day he cradled rye till noon, and 
then Avent to hunt a horse to ride to the appointed house. 
He had so much difficulty in finding a horse, that he was 
two hours behind time, and found the guests very impatient 
with so much waiting. However, he was married, and set 



392 HISTOEY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

up house-keeping for himself, Avith little of this world's 
goods. He was a schoolmate of A. P. Minear's, at St. 
George, and has since held several ofl&ces in the county ; 
his principal business has been farming and working with a 
saw-mill. He lives on Mill Eun, 1 mile from St. George. 
Their children are Malissa J., Solomon, Henry J., (Col.), 
Yirginia C, Liza A., Maggie S-, Laura and "Wilson. He 
was at Hannahsville when McChesney was killed, and 
heard Captain Miller brag of killing him ; he owns 223 acres 
of land, of which 55 acres is improved. 

George N. Day, of Pleasant Run, son of Jesse Day, of 
English descent, was born in 1854, and was married in 
1878 to Nancy Coberly, of Randolph County. Children: 
Arthur and Mary J.; his farm of 173 acres has 45 acres 
Improved, and lies 13 iriles from St. George. 

A. L. DuMiEE, born 1845, son of Jacob Dumire, married 
in 1865 to Anamelia, daughter of John M. Miller, of Lime- 
stone; he has 100 acres of land, one-half improved, on 
Limestone, six miles from St. George ; he was 16 months in 
the Union army, under Kelley. Since, he has been a mem- 
ber of the board of education and road survej'or. Children : 
Jasper F., Jacob H., Virginia M., and Anna Elizabeth. 

Jacob Dumike was born in 1817, son of John Dumire, of 
German descent." In 1842 he married Elizabeth, daughter 
of Emanuel Pifer. Their children are : Andrew L., Minerva 
J., John W., Oliver K., Anzaletta C, George M., and Flor- 
ence E. ,He is a farmer, and lives 5 miles from St. George, 
on Limestone ; his farm contains 150 acres, of which two- 
thirds is improved. His orchard is a good one, and he 
nearly always has apples and cider all winter. He has held 



For a niller lilstory or the Dumlie family, see another chapter of this book. 



BEIEF BIOGEAPHIES. 393 

many offices in the county, among which are justice of the 
peace, school offices and deputy sheriff twice. During the 
war he was a strong supporter of the Union cause, and led 
many Yankee scouts through the county. 

ALEXANDER Dice, born 1845, in Scotland, by trade a miner, 
came to America in 1866, mined 11 years in Hampshire, and 
came to Tucker in 1882 ; he is now a farmer, owning 
116 acres of land, with improvements on twenty acres. 

John William Dumiee was born in 1886 and married 
1857 to Margaret, daughter of John P. Gray; he has 90 
acres of improved land and 100 acres unimproved, on Lime- 
stone, 9 miles from St. George. Nine months of his life 
were spent in the Union army, under Kelly, defending the 
B. & O. Eailroad from Cumberland to Wheeling. His 
children are : Francis P., Adaline S., Harriet Susan, William 
S., Martha N., Priscilla and John D. He has been consta- 
ble, township clerk, and secretary of the board of education. 

Feancis Dumiee, son of the above, was born. in 1858, lives 
on Limestone, 9 miles from St. George, and is a farmer. 

Geoege D. Dumiee, son of Daniel Dumire, v/as born 1857, 
married 1879 to Anamelia Shook ; he is a farmer of 60 acres 
of land, one-half improved, and lives 8 miles from St. 
George, on Location. Children : William A., Henry H. W., 
and Clarinda F&nnj. 

Heney W. Dumiee, brother of George D., was born 1861, 
and married in 1880, to Mary E., daughter of David Harsh ; 
his farm of 60 acres, 25 acres improved, is on the Location, 
8 miles from St. George. His child's name is Lulu Yirginia. 

John H. Deets, of Preston County, was born 1844 and 
married 1866 Virginia, daughter of Samuel Bowman, of St. 



394 HISTOEY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

George ; lie lias a farm of 3G6 acres, with 150 improved, two 
miles below St, George ; he was six years constable. His 
children are : Lavina F., William E., Charles L., George S., 
Albert, David S. and Alice. He joined the Union army in 
1861, and was in St. George when Imboden swooped down 
upon the place. He, with the other prisoners, was paroled, 
and was sent to Camp Chase. There were, he says, 40,000 
Union soldiers there on parole, and half that number of 
Confederate prisoners. He was exchanged in 18G3 and 
came back and helped capture Captain Harper, Michael 
Myers and George Kalar. 

Ehinehart DomieE" w^as born in 1800, in Preston County. 
The history of his family has been given in another chapter 
of this book. In 1825 he married Catharine, daughter of 
Stephen Losh. Their children are, George N., Stephen, 
Reuben, Sarah, Maria, Rhinehart, Mary Ann, John W., 
Abraham and Savina. He died in 1875. 

Abraham Domire, son of Rhinehart Domire, was born in 
1842, on Horse Shoe Run. In 1864, he married Ann Sophia 
Shaffer, of Horse Shoe Run P. O. Their children are : 
Edgar J., William S., Jennet Catharine, Melissa Ellen and 
Joseph Pierce. He is a farmer of 790 acres, of which 125 
are improved, on Horse Shoe Run, 10 miles from St. George. 
He has not devoted his whole time to farming, but has paid 
attention to lumbering ; worked three years getting out 
shingle timber for the Rowlesburg Lumber & Iron Co., and 
three years longer as partner in the " Domire Shingle Mill;" 
sawed 100,000 a month, and sold his interest to George 
Shaffer ; has been road surveyor and school trustee. Iq 
his younger days he kiUed many deer — was only 15 years 

• The name Domire Is spelled In two ways. Thus : Domire and Dumire. It Is said 
he name originally was Toomlre. 



BKIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 395 

old when lie killed the first one; he tried to take it home, 
but it bloated before he got it there, and he stuck his kinfe 
in its side to let the air out, thinking that would help it. 

Cyrus F. Dumire, son of B. F. Dumire, of Preston Coun- 
ty, was born in 1858 ; is a young man of much enterprise, 
and has collected property to the amount of 775 acres of 
land, with 40 acres improved, and an interest in the " Do- 
mire Shingle Mill," besides other property, and has made it 
all himself. He is a farmer by occupation, but has super- 
intended steam saw-mills to some extent. 

Rhinehart Domire, Jr., son of Stephen Domire, was 
born in 1856; lives 10 miles from St. George, on Horse 
Shoe Run, where is his farm of 176 acres. In 1882 he was 
married to Anna, daughter of James Evans, of Ohio. 

Samuel R. Dumire, born in 1840 on "Old Andra," is a 
son of Frederick Dumire, and lives on Horse Shoe Run, 6 
miles from St. George ; his farm of 200 acres is one -fourth 
cleared; has worked twelve years at the carpenter trade, 
and was one of the first to work in St. George. In 1866 he 
was married to Sarena Domire, who died in 1880, and he 
married Sarah A. O'Donnell, of Illinois. The names of his 
children are, Letta May and Anna Emma. In 1876 he 
killed two bears with a very small shot gun, and filled an- 
other's head full of shot. He came out of the fight with 
two bears. 

Frederick Domire, brother to Rhinehart Domire, Sr., 
was born in 1806, and married in 1829 to Mary Ann 
Loughry, of Holly Meadows. Of six children, two only are 
living, who are Daniel L., and Samuel R. Frederick Do- 
mire was also a great hunter in his younger days, as nearly 
all the Domires were. He has killed many a deer and bear 



396 HISTOEY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

"with an old flint-lock gun, whicli lie still has on the rack 
over the door, just as hunters used to keep them. He is a 
farmer owning 16|^ acres, all improved, 9 miles from St. 
George, at the Leadmine post-ofl&ce. He built a mill there 
in 1842. It was a tub-mill, and ground 8 or 10 bushels a 
day. In the earliest yearn he spent there, wild animals 
were plentiful. In 8 years, he killed 160 deer. He says 
that John Grimes was the first settler on Horse Shoe Run. 
He lived on the Bonnifield farm. Dr. Chilcoat lived on 
the Evan's farm about the same time ; and John Carrico 
and John Stephenson were the next settlers (aside from 
Stephen Losh, who came earlier than 1818). Frederick Du- 
mire was postmaster for ten years before the war. 

Daniel L. Domike, son of Frederick Domire, was born in 
1834, at Limestone, on "Old Andra." In 1858 he married 
Susan Spesert, of Horse Shoe Run. Children: Margaret 
E., Mary Isabel, Edna Agnes and Sarah Alice. When he 
was 6 years old his father moved to Horse Shoe Run, and 
Las since lived there. D. L. Domire was brought up on 
the farm principally ; but, his inclination drew him toward 
mechanical pursuits, and he gave considerable attention to 
the carpenter trade. He also taught school twelve years on 
Horse Shoe Run, and from time to time engaged to some 
extent in the lumber business. His chief connection in 
this was in the " Domire Shingle Mill," in which he was 
partner. The mill would average 1,000,000 shingles a year, 
when steadily attended to. He owns 103 acres of land, one- 
half mile from the Leadmine post-office, on Laurel Run. 
He pays considerable attention to bee raising, and well 
understands the business. He helped build the first house 
that was built in St. George after the town was laid out. It 



BEIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 397 

was the " St. George Inn," and built in 1859. The same year 
he helped build the M. E. Church South, in St. George. At 
that time Jesse Parsons was sheriff, and Domire wrote aU 
his tax receipts ; he has several times been member of the 
board of education. 

Col. H. J. DuMiRE, son of D. K. Dumire, of Mill Run, 
one mile above St. George, was born in 1860; he is a farmer 
and school teacher, having taught five schools, all on No. 1 
certificates, except the first ; was a member of the board of 
examiners in 1882, and has been a delegate to senatorial, 
congressional and State conventions. 

Feedeeick R. Dumiee, brother to Rhinehart Dumire, was 
born in 1863, and lives with his brother on Horse Shoe Run. 

Sampson Day was born 1825, in Pendleton County, near 
the mouth of Seneca ; his parents, who were of English and 
German descent, were noted for their honesty, and their 
eight children received a pious training. Sampson, the 
third child, went to school one month each year for eight 
years, and never went any more. In 1846 he married a 
Miss Harman, who died in 1866. Day staid at home during 
the war, and did what he could in the cause of peace. He 
was a Union man, and served as a justice of the peace. In 
Pendleton County, strongly Southern, this is a good recom- 
mendation. He decided impartially for Union and Confed- 
erate. He was the man who held the election in Pendleton 
County, and had it go with the new State. He bought a 
farm at the mouth of Red Creek, and soon afterward mar- 
ried a Miss Waldren, and raised a family of nine children. 
He now lives on Dry Fork, in Tucker County. 

E 

Robert W. Eastham, a native Virginian, born in Rai')pa- 
hannock County, February 28, 1842, is the son of Capt. B. 



398 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

F. Eastliam, and is of English descent. He is one of the 
most perfect men, physically, in the county, State, or the 
the United States. Above six feet in height, well propor- 
tioned, deep and full chest, muscular limbs, and erect figure, 
he presents as fine appearance as ever Sam Houston did. 
He is active and athletic, walks with grace, and is a splen- 
did rider. 

He has had a liistor}', that, so far as the war and conse- 
quent adventures are concerned, hardly has a rival anywhere. 
Going into the field in Ajaril, 1861, he fought almost every 
day as long as the war lasted, and fought in two battles 
after Lee surrendered. Being a supporter of the Southern 
Confederacy he supported it from principle ; but the pros- 
pect of excitement and adventure had not a little to do in 
shaping his course. He is of a disposition that likes com- 
pany, and he is seldom seen without a crowd about him. 
There seems to be some attraction in him for other people. 
In ordinary affairs, he is quiet and sociable ; but when 
other people are excited, he is master of the situation. Fear 
has no part in his nature. Indeed, his bravery may at 
times amount to rashness. His sense of honor is such that 
he will not do an unmanl}' act ; or, if he forgets himself for 
the moment and errs in this, he is ready to right the wrong 
so far as apologies have power to do it. He hates a lie and 
cowardice and deceit as he hates everything that is mean ; 
and, one who sins in this particular must, before again gain- 
ing his favor, wipe out the contamination of the iniquitj' in 
a multitude of praiseworthy acts. 

When the war came on, in 1861, Eastham was among the 
very first to respond to the call, when Virginia threw her 
defense and her honor upon the heroism and manhood of 
her chivalrous sons. There was no hesitation as to which 



BEIEF BIOGEAPHIES. 399 

or what course to pursue. His first ambition was to show 
himself a man in repelling assault upon principles which he 
believed to be right. The intensity of Southern passion 
reached perfection in him ; and, at nineteen years of age, 
when he knew that his native State was calling for protec- 
tion, he hurried off to the front to offer his services in 
whichever department of the defense that they should be 
most needed. 

He joined Green's company, and was at once mustered 
into service and was quartered at Winchester. His battles 
began soon after. He marched to Harper's Ferry, April 19, 
1861 ; and from Harper's Ferry he went to Alexandria. The 
troops that were with him were the first and last and only 
Confederate troops that were stationed at Alexandria dur- 
ing the war. They remained there until they were shelled 
out by Pawnee. 

He was attached to Field's brigade, and Ewell's division, 
and was soon back in Winchester. He was also with Jones 
and Wheat, and when Wheat died, Eastham was tendered 
his place, bvit saw fit not to accept. After this, he was 
principally on scouting duty up to the battle of Gettysburg, 
and was under Jones the greater part of the time. 

His adventures and escapes were thrilling. Fifteen thous- 
and dollars was offered for him, dead or alive. x4t one time 
in battle, he was taken prisoner, but escaped before an 
hour. He was hunted by the Yankees with a perseverance 
surpassed only by the perseverance with which he hunted 
them. They feared and hated him, yet resj^ected him for 
daring. So determined were they upon taking him, that 
large numbers made that their special aim. He rode a good 
hor^e, and they had no show of overtaking him in a race. 
While they ransacked the country for him, he was raking 



400 HISTOKY OF TUCKEE COUNTY. 

tliem in, as ]3risoners, eyery day. After the second battle of 
Bull Run, thirty miles from the field, Eastham and eleven 
companions took prisoner sixty-five Yankees, whom Jackson 
had demoralized and driven into a thicket of brush. In this 
skirmish, Eastham was wounded in the foot by a Minie- 
ball. He was not in the Bull Bun fight, but was on the 
field next day. In another skirmish, a bullet passed through 
the horn of his saddle, one perforated his belt and one cut 
a button from his coat. 

In battle, he never used a saber. It is told of him, by 
those who were eye witnesses, that, when going into a fight, 
he would throw down his sword and cut a stout club, and 
with it knock right and left every one who came in his 
reach. He and his companions, thirteen in all, took eighty- 
six men in an hour. The men were retreating, by a road 
on which was a partly destroyed bridge. The Yankees ran 
upon the bridge and could not get over, and Eastham made 
them surrender. At another time, he and two others cap- 
tured thirty-six horses and twenty-three men in one day. 
He remained with Jones until the battle of Gettysburg, and 
Jones was sent south. He made a special request that 
Eastham be allowed to accomjDany him, but the request Avas 
not allowed, and the scout was left to scout for Yankees in 
Virginia. They also hunted for him and many a time he • 
had to save himself by flight or concealment. When, on 
one occasion, he had been out all day hunting for them, 
and had not seen one, he was coming down the road at 
dusk of evening and met an old negro whom he knew. The 
old fellow exclaimed in wonder, at seeing him alive: 
" Good heavens ! massa, de whole world am full of Yankees 
huntin' foh you." At that moment he heard galloping 
horses in the distance. He took a grain-cradle and a bas- 



BEIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 401 

ket wliicli the negro was carrying, and climbed the fence 
into the field, having put his horse out of sight. He threw 
down a sheaf of wheat and sat upon it. The soldiers came 
by and saw him ; but in the dusk of evening they did not 
recognize him. He watched them go by, and then mounted 
his horse and struck after them. He followed them boldly 
into town, dismounted and entered into conversation with 
them. He went into a store and bought him some tobacco, 
and made free with all about him. None recognized him, 
until a little negro came along. The little scamp knew him 
and yelled out : " I do 'clah ! tha's Bob Eastham !" 

Immediately the whole town full of Yankees started up 
and rushed at him. He sprang on his horse and dashed 
through them, knocked them down and rode over them, 
and finally reached the edgg of the town. By this time the 
whole body of the enemy had mounted, and horsemen were 
galloping in every direction to hunt him down and head 
him off. He dashed up the mountain and escaped. So 
daring was he that no Yankee could feel safe when he was 
in the country. He would cross the lines and ride through 
the camp, and probably carry off a prisoner. Once he went 
to a house and got dinner, when the house was full of Yan- 
kees, and at another time he went into a stable, where 
several Union soldiers were sleeping, and took away the 
officers' horses. This is why they so hated him. He was 
upon them before they were aware of it, and he always, or 
nearly always, came out best. But, sometimes he had to 
hide and slip about in the quietest manner to keep from 
being taken. He had to bury himself in a rail-pile, and 
lie flat in a potato patch and conceal himself under a stone 
fence, while they were all around him. But, he always es- 
caped, and finally came to believe that it was impossible 

26 



402 HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

for him to be hurt. With this belief and assurance he 
went to his father's house when he knew that Yankees were 
thick around and while the $15,000 reward was on him. 
While he was in one room, two Yankee officers were in 
another. He heard them talking of him, and how much 
they wovild like to see him. But, they had little idea of 
seeing him so soon. For, he kept quiet until they had gone 
to supper, and then he concluded to give them an oppor- 
tunity to take him, if they liked. While they were eating, 
and seemingly in full enjoyment of the substantial fare 
which Virginian hospitality had placed before them, he 
walked boldly into the dining room where they sat at the 
table. His father introduced him to them as "My son, 
Hobert, the man you are looking for." They turned and 
looked at the tall figure before them, clad in full Confeder- 
ate uniform, and armed from head to foot. His belt 
gleamed with the hilt of a saber and with the handles of 
pistols. The officers evidently would rather have been 
excused from making new acquaintances that evening ; but, 
they had the presence of mind to make the best of the sit- 
uation. They shook hands, and he sat down at the table 
with them, and talked two hours. They made no attempt 
or showed no disposition to capture him, and he was al- 
loAved to depart in peace. 

He was with Mosby in his raids, and was all through the 
Yalley of Virginia. He was in Jones' Raid in June, 18G3, 
through Preston County, when Rowlesburg, Kingwood and 
Morgantown were taken, and when E. Harper piloted the 
Rebels that bm-nt the Fairmont bridge. He was in the 6th 
Virginia, which " locked sabers " with the 6th New York 
fourteen times during the war. In the battle of Fairfield 
the New York regiment was finally overthrown. 



BKIEF BIOGKAPHIES. 403 

When the news was received that Lee had surrendered, 
Eastham was one of the many who refused to believe it, be- 
cause he did not want to belive it. He remained in the 
field and refused to surrender. He fought two battles after 
Lee had laid down his arms. Eastham never surrendered. 
He escaped without that humiliation. He remained with 
Mosby until that guerrilla leader disbanded his men. 

After the war was over, he returned to the farm and went 
to work. But after his four years of war he could not feel 
satisfied with the tame existence of a farmer ; so he sold out 
and went South. He visited North and South Carolina, 
Alabama, Georgia and Tennessee, and finally grew tired of 
roaming. He returned to Virginia, and married Mary C, 
daughter of Dr. A. W. Eeid, of Eappahannock County, Va. 
This was in 1869. In 1876, in May, he came to Tucker and 
bought land in the Canaan Valley, 30 miles from St. George. 
His farm of 276 acres has 40 improved and in grass. He 
built a farm house and other buildings, and was prospering 
well enough when a fire in the woods caught his house 
while he was absent, and burnt everything. He had not a 
dollar left, nor even a coat to wear. Everything that would 
burn was burnt, except two horses, a cow, a dog and a cat. 
His financial condition was not flourishing. However, he 
borrowed a coat, and went to Oakland and bought a suit on 
credit. He went on to Eastern Virginia where he had a 
little x3roperty. He came back to St. George, where the 
town authorities had some charge against him, and at- 
tempted to arrest him. In the scuffle, Frank and Dock Pi- 
fer tore his coat off of him, and some one else got his hat, 
and he had to go home coatless and hatless. 

Wlien he went to Canaan there were only three families 
there, Solomon Cosuer, John Nines and James Freeland. 



404 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

Eastliam lived there till 1883, and farmed and raised stock 
with various siicces. By that time the W. Va. C. & P. R. 
W. was coming into the country, and was no longer a sub- 
ject of speculation. It was confidently expected that it 
would greatly enhance the prosperity of Canaan. 

At the mouth of Bever the site was selected for the ter- 
minus of the road. The contract for clearing away the 
timber for the city was given Eastham, and soon after he 
moved there with his family, and built him a residence. 
This was the first house built in a city which is to be called 
Davis. As yet, there is no city there. The floating popu- 
lation amounts to twenty or more. But a town must be 
there in the near future, and Robert Eastham will be re- 
garded as the founder of it. Under his supervision all the 
work so far has been done. In consideration of this, it 
would be no more than justice to name the city Eastha]^. 
It is a genuine English name, and is a suitable name for a 
town, and such ought to be its name. 

In 1882, Eastham was a candidate for the Legislature, to 
be elected by Tucker and Randolph Counties. Although not 
elected, he ran a heavy poll, and carried his own district by 
an overwhelming majority. 

John H. Evans was born in Hardy County, in 1841; 
married in 1874 to Maria Michael, of Grant County. Chil- 
dren: Cora Anna, Mary E., Charles W. and Mary J.; 
farmer, lives in Canaan. 

Samuel H. Ewin, a merchant of St. George, and a son of 
William Ewin, was born in 1836 in Baltimore, and was 
married in 1864 to Sarah A. Kulin, of the same ciij. He is 
of Irisli descent. He lived in Baltimore from 1852 to 1862, 
when he went into the Union army and remained in the 



BRIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 405 

service nearly three years. He was commissary sergeant. 
He was at tlie battles of Antietam, Bolivar Heights, Cedar 
Mountain and several others. He is a painter by trade. 
He came to St. George in 1882. 

William Evans was bom in 1818, died in 1874, on Horse 
Shoe Run, 11 miles from St. George. He married Lyda 
Kitzmiller. Children: James I., Solomon A., John Alex- 
ander, William Lewis, George A., Warner B., David C, 
Perry J., Mary A. and Lucy Ellen. He came to Tucker in 
1860, and purchased a farm of 455 acres and had 140 acres 
tinder improvement, and had 100 fruit trees in bearing 
condition. 

David C. Evans was born in 1857 in Hardy County ; mar- 
ried in 1876 to OUie Calhoun; of German descent. His 
children are : Eliot F. and Abraham, named after Abraham 
Bonnifield. He is a farmer of 246 acres, with sixty acres 
improved and a good orchard of 100 trees. 

Solomon H. Evans, brother to David C. and sotx of 
William Evans, was born in 1843 ; English and German 
descent ; married in 1871 to Catharine Shaffer, of Preston 
County. Children : Ama, Stella, Lewis. MoUie, Harry, 
John and Dollie. He is a farmer, living on Horse Shoe 
Run, ten miles from St. George. He owns 270 acres of 
land, of which 40 acres are improved and the rest is well 
timbered. He has a good orchard. He followed the shoe- 
making trade 12 years, but gave it up for farming. 

James I. Evans, brother of Solomon Evans, was born in 
1842, in Hampshire County ; married in 1874, to Emma 
C. Whitehair, of Preston County. Children : Florence 
May, Jennie Belle, Cora Etna and Ida. He is a farmer and 
miller, living at the Lead Mine Post-office, 10 miles from St. 



406 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

George. His is the largest and best mill in Tucker County. 
It is on the site of Frederick Domire's tub-mill, of 1-842, 
and is where Mason's mill used to stand. It has a set of 
corn-rocks and a pair of buhrs. The mill grinds about 6,000 
bushels a year, rather more wheat than corn. The mill is a 
new one, having been rebuilt in 1879. He also owns a saw- 
mill that will cut 1,000 feet a day. 

James Evans, brother of William Evans, was born in 
Hampshire County, in 1832, In 1855 he was married to 
Lucinda, daughter of "William Losh. Children : E valine, 
John William, Mary Jane, Emaline, Phoebe Ann, Lettie, 
Maggie May, Nellie and Eddie. He married a second time 
in 1877, to Sarah Carr, of Illinois. In 1865 he went to Indi- 
ana and staid 4 years ; then went to Illinois and remained 13 
years, and returned to West Virginia, where he follows the 
occupation of farming. 

F. 

Hamilton Fink, son of Elias Fink, of Rockingham 
County, Virginia, of French and German descent, was born 
in 1842, and in 1869 was married to Emeline Ramsey, of 
Barbour County. Children: Ida May, Bashy C, Elias, 
Nancy A., Cora B., William Arthur and Michael. He is a 
farmer, owning 112 acres of land, of which 32 are improved ; 
spent three years in the Rebel army, under Lee most of 
the time, but part of the time under Imboden, Brecken- 
ridge and Early, and was in nearly every battle in the Val- 
ley of Virginia for two years, and was in the battles of 
Gettysburg and Williamsport. He was in both of Lee's in- 
vasions of the North; he was four times wounded, and 
another ball broke the skin on his nose. He was never 
taken prisoner, but came near falling into his enemy's 
hands at Beverly. He was passing through the town be- 



BKIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 407 

fore it was fairly light, and was halted by six men, whom he 
mistook for Rebels, and whom he told that he was no Yan- 
kee. They said that they knew it, and demanded his sur- 
render. He said that he had surrendered, and when they 
put down their guns, he sprang behind a house and ran off. 

John E. M. Fitzwater, son of William Fitzwater, was 
born in the year 1859. In 1879 he married Salina, daughter 
of Elihu Phillips. Farmer of 51 acres, 15 improved, 6 
miles from St. George, on Clover Run. Children : Elihu M. 
and Russel I. 

"William Fitzwater, father of John E. M., and son of 
John, of German descent, was born 1833, and married in 
1852, to M. M., daughter of Jacob Shafer. He is a farmer, 
owning 176 acres, 50 of which is farming land, 8 miles from 
St. George, on Texas Mountain. Children : Almeda, Silas 
J., Manda C, Barbara A., John E. M., Sarah V., Jacob F., 
Judah, Etta May, Ida Olive and Savina J. 

Bernard W. Fisher, from Augusta County, Va., of Ger- 
man descent, was born in 1841, and married in 1865 to Mary 
L. Hill, of Cumberland, Md. Children: Lilly S., May 
Belle, Carl C, Edmund H., Delia V., Zora M., Ward H., 
Otto and Nora. By occupation he is a farmer and carpen- 
ter ; lives on a farm 2 miles from St. George, on Clover Run ; 
has been in the county since 1879. He was in the Union 
army, in Hancock's corps at Gettysburg ; he was also in the 
battles of Antietam, Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville, Bull 
Run, Wilderness, Spottsylvania, Cold Harbor and about 
Richmond. At Cold Harbor he was wounded in the leg by 
a Minie-ball, which broke one bone ; he cut the bullet out 
and has it yet. 

Jacob W. Flanagan, son of Jacob Flanagan, born in 1848; 



408 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

was married in 1868 to a daughter of Jacob Fansler ; far- 
mer, owning 130 acres of land, 30 improved ; lives 12 miles 
from St. George, on Black Fork. Children : Elizabeth J. 
and Thomas W. 

F. W. S. FoLLEY, of Irish descent, was born 1852, in Grant 
County ; married in 1874 to Mary High, daughter of "War- 
ner T. High, of Hampshire County. Children : Bertha P., 
Homer D. and Michael Marion ; clerk at Fairfax. 

Jesse Flanagan, son of John Flanagan, of Irish and Eng- 
lish descent, was bom in 1827, and in 1858 he married 
Catharine Carr. In 1860 his wiie died, and he then married 
Malinda Rohrbaugh, daughter of George Rohrbaugh. He 
is a farmer, living 28 miles from St. George, on Red Creek. 

Aechibald B. Flanagan, born 1849, son of Ebenezer Flan- 
agan, of Irish descent, was married in 1873, to Amanda J., 
daughter of Solomon Cosner, of Canaan. Children : Solo- 
mon W., Elizabeth A. and Hannah C. He is a farmer, with 
100 acres of cultivated and pasture land, and 211 acres of 
land in woods ; lives 25 miles from St. George, on Dry 
Fork. 

N. H. Flanagan, born 1860, son of Alfred Flanagan, lives 
25 miles from St. George on Dry Fork. 

W. A. Feely, from Shenandoah Count}^ Va., of English 
and Irish descent, was born in 1839, and married, in 1882, 
Stella F., daughter of Jonathan Wilson, of Garrett County, 
Md. He is a member of the mercantile lirm of Feely Sc 
"Wilson, at Fairfax. 

S. L. Fansler, born 1843, son of Jacob Fansler, of Ger- 
man descent, married in 1870 to Mary "Ward, daughter of 
Peter AVard. Children : Albert G. and Arthur D. He is a 
farmer, owns 568 acres of land, and has 200 acres improved, 



BKIEF BIOGEAPHIES. 409 

on Black Fork, 11 miles from St. George ; is a man of influ- 
ence, and stands high in the estimation of all who know 
liim. His ancestors were the first settlers of that region. 
Henry Fansler settled in Canaan in 1802, it is supposed. 

H. M. Fekguson was born in 1854, in Eandolph County ; 
son of R. M. Ferguson, and of Irish descent; married in 
1880 to Margaret S. Kalar. Their child's name is Laird D.; 
lives near Fairfax. 

George W. Fansler, son of Andrew Fansler, was bom in 
1842, and married in 1877 to Mary A. R. Domire, daughter 
of Washington Domire ; is a farmer of 210 acres, with 55 
acres improved, and lives 14 miles from St. George, on Dry 
Fork; has been road surveyor 15 years. Children: Anna 
Tilden and Stark Andrew. 

Alfred Flanagan, son of Ebenezer Flanagan, was bom 
in 1840 ; married in 1860, to Hannah S., daughter of J. H. 
IJambert. Children : Nathaniel H., James H., Hannah E., 
Alfred K. and William Hess; is a farmer of 126 acres, 
wdth 20 acres improved, on Dry Fork, 26 miles fi'om St. 
George ; was a Home Guard during the war. 

J. F. Funk was born in 1839, in Preston County, son of 
Jonathan Funk ; married in 1870 to Maggie Eliot ; is a 
farmer of 134 acres, 60 acres improved, nine miles below 
St. George. Children : James John AVilliam Alonzo, Susan 
Alberta and Cora Analiza. 

John H. Fansler was born in 1840 at Black Fork, son of 
Jacob Fansler ; married in 1861 to Jemima E., daughter of 
Job Parsons. Children : Rufus M., Althea M., William 
T., Stephen T., Clarence S., Sarah Ann., Job P. and Ira B. 
He lives on Horse Shoe Run, 8 miles from St. George ; has 
lived there since 1863. When he first commenced work on 



410 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

the farm, there was ten acres improved. Now he has 80 

acres under cultivation and 582 in the woods, well timbered. 

The Rowlesburg Lumber and Iron Company ran a shingle 

mill on his farm and made 2,500,000 shingles, and afterwards 

500,000 more were made. His farm is well improved, and a 

church, mill and school house are at hand. He is of German 

descent. 

G. 

N. GoFF, son of Allen Goff, born 1858, married, 1882, to 

Elizabeth, daughter of William Gable, of Preston County. 

By occupation he is a laborer, living 7 miles from St. George, 

on Licking. Children : Rosalie, Lilly May, Orlando P. and 

William Camden. 

David W. Gilmore, son of William Gilmore, born 1862 ; 
lives 3 miles from St. George, on Clover Run ; is a farmer, 
owning 63 acres, 10 improved. 

P. B. Goff, son of John R. Goff, was born in 1853 ; is of 
English descent ; is a farmer, owning 250 acres, 100 of which 
is improved, lying on Black Fork, 10 miles from St. George. 

James D. Geiffith, born 1850, in Preston County ; son of 
Hillory Griffith, of German, Irish and English descent; 
married in 1876 to Leonora Hart, daughter of David Hart. 
Children : Maud, Harry C, Lloyd F., David C. and Sallie ; 
farmer and carpenter, owning 125 acres of unimproved 
land ; lives 3 miles from St. George, in Holly Meadows ; his 
father died in the Union army. 

S. D. Gillespie was born in 1850, in Pennsylvania, of 
Irish descent. He has been foreman on the W. Va. C. & P. 
R. W. since 1880. 

Henry J. Goff was born in 1854, son of Amassa Goff, of 
Scotch descent ; is a farmer, living 5 miles from St. George, 



BRIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 411 

in Licking District ; his farm of 165 acres, is one-fourth 
improved. 

Benjamin P. Gower was born in 1857, son of Daniel 
Gower, of German descent. In 1879, he married A. S., 
daughter of John U. Chambers. Children : John W. and 
Rosa Lee ; is a farmer and miUer, living 4 miles from St. 
George, on MiU Run. 

Joseph Grey was born in 1854, son of John P. Grey, was 
married in 1880 to Mary C, daughter of Aaron J. Loughry. 
Children : Savilla M. and Anna M. He lives 3 miles from 
St. George. 

Isaac A. Gilmore, son of David Gilmore, of Scotch and 
German descent, was born in 1824 in the Horse Shoe ; was 
man-ied in 1843 to Margaret Skidmore. In 1862 his wife 
died, and he married Electa C, daughter of William Miller, 
of Licking District. Again in 1866 his wife died, and he 
married M. J., daughter of John S. Hart, of Randolph ; is 
a farmer, lives 14 miles from St. George, and has been sev- 
eral times a member of the board of education. 

Nelson A. Gilmore was born in 1860, son of D. H. Gil- 
more, lives 14 miles from St. George on Shafer's Fork. 

Isaac B. Godwin was born in 1817, in Preston County, of 
Irish and German descent. In 1838 he married Mary Coff- 
man, of Barbour. He lives at Limestone, 7 miles from St. 
George. Children: Lyda, Robert, Jacob, Sarah, Barbara 
E., Mary E. and Andrew. 

George F. Griffith, brother of James Griffith, was born 
in 1856. In 1876 he married Sarah Caroline Harper. His 
wife died in 1882. For a second wife he married Laura- 
Wolf, of Barbour. He is by trade a carpenter, and follows 
the business at St. George. For 4 years he was town 



412 HISTOKY OF TUCKEE COUNTY. 

councilman. His father died at Wheeling, while in the 
Union army, and his brother died in St. George from the 
effects of a gun-shot, accidentally received while hunting on 
the river above town. 

S. W. Geoghan was born in Barbour in 1851, of Irish de- 
scent ; married Eliza P. Poling in 1871. Children : Cor- 
lista B., Geneva E., Patrick M., Lyeton L., Carrie M., 
Orinetta and Staley "W.; is a farmer and lumberman. 

H. 

W. P. Haksh, son of Adam Harsh, was born in 1861.; 
married in 1883 to Mary J., daughter of William Godwin; 
lives on Texas Mountain, 8 miles from St. George. 

George E. Helmick, son of Mathias Helmick, born in 
Pendleton County in 1853 ; is of English descent ; married 
in 1872, to Phebe Somerfield ; farmer, owTiing 168 acres, 
35 improved, 7 miles from St. George. Children : Mathias, 
Manda M., Isaac H., Mary E., Lenora E., Eosetta, Susan P. 
and Hulda J. 

Geoege I. HovATTEE, son of Christopher Hovatter, was 
born in 1858 ; married in 1879 to Olive, daughter of E. 
Kiser, of Barbour County ; farmer, 37 acres, 3 acres im- 
proved, 5 miles from St. George, on Bull Eun. Tabitha M. 
is their only child. 

David Hovattee, son of Christopher Hovatter, was bom 
in 1810 ; married Sarah A., daughter of Hesakiah Thomp- 
son ; died 1881. Children : Hesakiah, Malinai J., Susan, 
Michael, Henry, David, John, Ingaby and Elizabeth. 

Isaac Hovattee. of German descent, son of AVilliam 
Hovatter, was born in 1854, in Barbour County ; married in 
1884 to Emily C, daughter of Theodore B. Lipscomb. He 
lives on a farm of 102 acres, 60 acres improved, 6 miles from 
St. George, on Licking. His child's name is Carrie M. 






BEIEF BIOGEAPHIES. 413 

George M. Hovatter, brotlier to Isaac, was born 1846, 
married 1868 to Mary J., daughter of Jacob Nester. His 
farm contains 768 acres, 35 acres of wliicli is improved. He 
lives 6 miles from St. George, on Texas Mountain. He be- 
longed to the Union Home Guard, in Barbour County, 
during the war. Children : William W., Milla M., Salon 
B., Harriet M. and Wade H. 

David Hovatter, from Barbour County, is the son of 
David Hovatter, and was born in 1853 ; in 1877 he married 
Tena L., daughter of George Shahan ; is a farmer, owning 
72 acres, 10 of which are improved ; lives 5 miles from St. 
George, on Bull Bun. Children : Charles, Lillie C. and 
Wilbert. 

John W. Helmick, born 1860, in Pendleton County ; of 
English descent; married in 1882, to Phebe J. Waybright; 
is a farmer, living in the Sugar Lands, five miles from St. 
George. They have one child, named Sloma C. 

Lloyd Hansford, son of W. W. Hansford, of Black Fork, 
was born March 16, 1857. In his younger school years he 
attended school under S. R. Dumire, Miss Jane Parsons, 
V. N. Gribble, A. B. Parsons and P. Lipscomb. This was 
at the Mount Pleasant School. Lloyd entered the Fair- 
mont Normal School in September, 1876, and graduated in 

1879, being the first graduate in Tucker from any of the 
Normal Schools of the State, While in the Normal School, 
he served awhile as instructor in the mathematical depart- 
ment. Afterward he came home and taught a select school 
at Alum Hill, and from his school sent fourteen applicants 
before the Board of Examiners, and they were all granted 
certificates. The school of ten weeks closed in September, 

1880, and he entered into a stock company whose object 



414 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

■was to foster the Tucker Democrat ^ wliicli, at tliat time, was 
not self-sustaining. The company numbered among its 
members Senator Ewin, A. B. Parsons, L. S. Auvil and 
others, Hansford was elected Editor ; for, it seems that 
the paper was conducted on the plan of those religious de- 
nominations that elect their preacher instead of selecting 
him, or allowing him to select himself. Hansford, with 
almost no experience in the business, was elected to manage 
the paper the first year. 

On the 19th of Sept., 1880, he was appointed principal of 
the Eetterman school, with two assistants. The newspaper 
business had furnished him plenty of hard work; but the 
pay had not been as good as he wished. He had mean- 
while, been studying the law, under Caleb Boggess, of 
Clarksburg."' 

In 1881 he was appointed first assistant in the Piedmont 
Graded School, which he accepted. He then took con- 
tracts on the W. Va. C. & P. R. W. and worked just one 
year, at various kinds of work and with different crews of 
men. He belonged to the engineer corps that located the 
railroad from Fairfax to Bever. In 1883 he was appointed 
teacher of the St. George school. At the convention of 
June 7, 1884, he received the nomination for prosecuting 
attorney of Tucker County. He is a young man of steady 
habits, and has a good education. 

Albert Hovatter was born in 1864, son of Elton Hovat- 
ter, lives on a rented farm four miles from St. George. 

Stephen Harsh, son of Andrew Harsh, of German de- 
scent, was born in 1851, and married in 1874 to Dortha E. 
Goff; lives 6 miles from St. George, on the Limestone 

• For a sketch of Hanatord as a lawyer see " History of the St. George Bar," In this 
took. 



BKIEF BIOGEAPHIES. 415 

road ; farm of 95 acres witli 40 acres improved. Children : 
Cora Ann, Walter McClure, Josephine Gertrude, Samuel S., 
Dora May and Nora Lee. He belongs to a family of great 
physical strength and power of endurance. 

Eeuben W. Hebb, son of John Hebb, was born in 1847, 
in Preston County; married in 1874, to Margaret James. 
Children: Jasper L., Sarah O., Harvey D. and George H.; 
is a farmer and lives on Location, four miles from St. 
George. 

T. F. Hebb, of English descent, son of Thomas Hebb, was 
born in 1823* ; married in 1842 to Catharine, daughter of 
Hiram Sanders ; his wife died in 1853, and he married Mary 
Ann, daughter of Levi Lipscomb. Children : Sarah A., 
Thomas F., John C, Joseph H. and Martha E.; lives 5 
miles below St. George on a farm of 175 acres, of which 75 
acres are improved ; has been in Tucker since 1876 ; has 
held several offices in the county ; he was on the board of 
supervisors in 1866, and held office until the constitution 
went out of force ; held the position of president of the 
board of education for 12 years. Li 1861, he entered the 
Union army, and remained in it until 1865 ; was at Rowles- 
burg when Jones made his raid into that quarter ; was in 
several skirmishes and in one of them had his knee thrown 
out of place, from the effect of which his right side has ever 
since been almost helpless. 

John Hebb, son of T. F. Hebb, born 1847, married 1871, 
to Marcilla, daughter of David H. Lipscomb. Children : 
Maud C, Charles "W., Albert T., Augusta Lee, Solomon E., 

*T. F. Hebb's grandfather was sent to America during the Revolutionary war, as a 
British soldier. After he landed he deserted and Joined the Americans. He was dis- 
charged from service before the close of the war, but when Cornwall is raided into 
Virgrlnia, he again took the field in common with the Virginia troops and was present 
at the battle of Yorktown, which resulted in the defeat of the British. 



416 HISTOEY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

Ira C, and baby. He is a farmer, and lives five miles below 
St. George. 

David B. Hansford, born 1863, sou of Wesley Hansford ; 
lives 12 miles above St. George, on a farm of 70 acres, 
one-tliird improved. 

John Hansfoed, of English descent, born 1832, son of 
Acra Hansford ; married, 1858, to Savana, daughter of Jolin 
Bright. Children : Benjamin F., Anzalina, Florence O., 
Cornelius P., Jeremiah A., Montiville M. G., Margaret and 
Columbia C. He owns one-half acre of land on Pleasant 
Kun ; was John Losh's partner in hunting during onfe win- 
ter ; lives 12 miles above St. George. 

Joseph H. Hebb, son of T. F. Hebb, was born in 1849 ; 
lives on Limestone, 4 miles from St. George ; married in 
1879 to Mary E. Goff. Children : Eddy May, Lyda M. C. 
and Bertha E. 

Phillip M. Helmick, son of Miles Helmick, of Pendleton 
County, was born in 1856, and married in 1877 to Nancy R. 
daughter of Isaac Parsons, of Cheat River. When he mar- 
ried he was 21 years of age, and his wife was 66. In 1883, 
his wife died, and the same year he married Elizabeth, 
daughter of Mathias Helmick ; is a farmer, owning 62 acres 
of land, 35 acres improved. 

Abraham L. Helmick was born in 1864, son of A. B. Hel- 
mick, of English descent, lives 7 miles from St. George in 
the Sugar Lands ; been in Tucker since 1872. 

George W. Helmick, brother of Philip, born in 1860. In 
1878 he married Alice Simmons. Children : Nettie V., Wil- 
son and Laura ; lives on a farm of 7 acres with 2 acres 
I)artly improved, 6 miles from St. George, on the road lead- 
ing to the Sugar Lands. 



TUilEF BIOGEAPHIES. 417 

ii. X . iirx.:.:!,'.:^, born 1838, was a son of Miles Helmick ; 

^ : ■> inarmd in 1858, to Elizabeth, dangliter of George Hel- 

>She died, and he married Siisana Davis, of Peudle- 

iren: John W., James B., Martha L., 

idron McClure, Alfred Hampton, Becca and 

i ' - , a i'arinor of 160 acres in the Sugar Lands ; was 

i":. ■'. ; i.M-l,--" :!.- army at Garnett's defeat at Corrick's 

j^on- , he joined the Union army, and v>'as hon- 

oi'ably diS(jbarg;r;. i. % the close of the war. 

Abraham Helmk.k, born 1842, in Pendleton County, son 

''' Helmick; married, 1861, to Catharine MuUennax. 

•^ ' id he married Prudence, daughter of 

andolph Count}^ Children : Abraham 

i^ort, Martin Howard and Effie Huldy ; is 

•i OS, with 50 acres improved, almost every 

• i' which J \e has cleared himself ; has a large part of 

..iiv. sown <]ovvn in grass, and cuts a considerable 

I of hn-v ^--hich he feeds to stock; is a prosperous 

' the Sugar Lands, seven miles from St. 

.. d the Confederate army at the com- 

*:i' p' ar. At Alleghany he was shot through 

l:uSr.iiVL.i dnie-ball, and at Laurel Hill he was 

kr.r,, Vorl . ,, shell; was in Garnett's retreat. In 

de left the Confederate army and joined 

.^.s in several battles, Gett^'sburg among 

.'icm, and ■. .b also in several skirmishes along the B. & O. 

7ll. R., notably t'; tt of Paw Paw Tunnel ; he fought through 

*-he entire war, and has since lived on a farm. Once he 

. iac;" killed by a bear which he had caught in a 

ind tried to catch him, and he could 

vi; '), taking his gun with him. Finally, he 



418 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

Mathias Helmick, born 1828, son of George Helmick, of 
Randolph County, married Melvina Yandevanter. Children : 
Sarah C, George E., Robert, Charles D., Sansom D., Phoebe, 
Phillip M., Mordicaai P., Mar}- J., Martha E. an(" "^'im'-.i-. 
Mathias was one of the Dry Fork Home Guards, . 

many skirmishes. 

RoBEPiT Helmick, born in 1855, son of Mathias '. 
married Martha Boner, of Dry Fork, daughter .. :. 

Boner. Children : Walter F. and Simon S.; farme; ts 

from St. George, in Sugar Lands. 

AViLLiAM Hull, of English and Irish descent, wai 'orn in 
Hampshire County, in 1822 ; married Jemima Tu 
lives on a farm on Horse Shoe Run, five miles frvom St. 
George. Children: Mary E., James F., Thomas M., « '' 
son T., John O., Upton Seymour, William "W., Y ■ 
and Harriet Isabel. 

G. T. Hull, son of William Hull, born 1852 ; n: 
1875, to Margaret, daughter of George Spesert, .*' ;■ 
Shoe Run. Children : William H., Mary J., Albev 
Lizzie Delia ; he lives in St. George. 

David Hansfoud, son of Acra Hansford, was boi:: ;.. l'*:^. , 
and married in 1865, to Susan, daughter of Joshua Yanscov. 
Children: Hamon L., Perry J., Columbus B., La^'^rna J. 
George Harmon, Margaret C. and Delphia Ma}-. 

EiiASMUS A. Hammox, born in 1846, in Yirginia ; (oarrie-: 
1871, to Sarah A., daughter of Abraham Inlow ; 
acres of land, with 25 acres of improvement. < hilJrei: 
Ephriam F. and Daisy Ellen. 

E. HAiiPEi:. A full history of E. Harper is give /the; 

parts of this book, therefore it is not given here. •''< - 



BEIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 419 

four miles from St. George, on Clover Eun, and is a farmer 
and doctor, and owns 4,500 acres of land. 

William P. Hebb, son of John Hebb, was born in 1832, 
and was married to Margaret Lipscomb in 1853. Children : 
Jemima C, Mary E., James A., Berlinda J., Delia V., Mel- 
vina M., William H., Eeuben T., Daniel K., Ida M., Arthur 
Levi, George W. and Margaret G. His farm of 100 acres is 
half improved ; 4 miles from St. George, on Location. He 
was taken prisoner by the men who came into Tucker with 
McChesney, and was carried to Eich Mountain ; was a pris- 
oner, tied to S. E, Parsons in Garuett's retreat. Parsons 
escaped on Hog Back, but Hebb was carried to Petersburg, 
tried and liberated. After this he joined the Union army, 
and was taken prisoner by Jones at the time of his raid on 
Eowlesburg, but was kept only one day. 

James B. Helmick, son of P. M. Helmick, born in 1864 ; 
is a laborer b}' occupation. 

B. F. Hansfoed, son of J. M. Hansford, was born in 1859, 
and married in 1877, to Barbara M., daughter of Moses 
Phillips. Children: Ida J., Harriet D. and Lamiria ; farms 
7 acres of improved land, and owns 40 acres of wild land 
on Clover Eun. 

J. S. Hart, born 1853, in Pennsylvania ; married Alice 
Stone in 1875. Children : Ida P. and Walter L. ; is a far- 
mer of 33 acres, with 20 acres of tilled land, on Location, 5 
miles from St. George. 

George Hopkins, of English and German descent, was born 
in Preston County ; married Mary E, Spesert in 1859, and 
has since lived in Tucker County, and been a farmer. Chil- 
dren : Ida Ellen and Levi Wesley ; owns 68 acres of land, ten 
miles from St. George, on the waters of Horse Shoe Eun. 



420 HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

Levi Hile was born about 1817, in Germany ; is a man 
peculiar and eccentric, and is well known over the county, 
many people claiming that he has supernatural power in 
controlling bees, wasps, yellow-jackets and stinging insects. 
He claims this power, and is willing to take a good stinging 
in order to make people believe that the bees will not sting 
him ; will walk into a hornet's nest and claim that they do 
not harm him. They do sting him, but it seems the effect 
is slight on him. He married Nancy Gower, and their chil- 
dren are, Mary, Anamelia and Samuel ; is a farmer, living 
on Hile Run, 9 miles from St. George. 

I. 

A. J. IpiOXK, son of Henry Irons, was born in Maryland, 

in 181:1 ; is of German descent, and was married, in 1862, 

to Amanda, daughter of John Bright. Children : Malinda, 

Seymour G., Thomas J., Margaret D., Emma T., Clara D., 

Ara B., Flossa L., Henrj^ J. and Harlan E. His farm of 235 

acres, 100 improved, is on Shafer's Fork, 14 miles from St. 

George. Mr. Irons is road surveyor and a member of the 

board of education. 

J. 

EuGENUS Johnson, son of Robert Johnson^ of English 

and German descent, lives on Black Fork, 11 miles from St. 

George, where he has 75 acres of cleared land on a farm of 

125 acres ; also follows the blacksmith business ; was born 

in 1852 ; was once elected constable, but did not serve. In 

1875, he married Martha A., daughter of Madison Lambert. 

Children : Luther M., Elizabeth M. and Rosa Belle. In his 

life he killed bears. 

H. J. Johnson,' brother to Eugenus, was born in 1842, 
and married in 1875, to Amanda, daughter of Adouijah 
Phillips. His farm contains 350 acres, with 40 acres under 



BRIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 421 

cultivation. Children : Ezekiel H., Harper J., Jacob C. and 
Birdie C. He lives on Dry Fork, 12 miles from St. George ; 
was in the Confederate army 18 months, and was with Im- 
boden on his first raid into Tucker. In his life he has killed 
20 bears. 

Sampson O. Johnson, son of E. P. Johnson, was born in 
Randolph in 1852, and in 1869 married Alice, daughter of 
Jesse Davis, of Pendleton County. Children : Stephen, 
Archibald and Benjamin ; lives on rented land, 22 miles 
from St. George, on Dry Fork ; was married at 17 years of 
age. 

J. M. Jenkins was born in 1831, in Preston County. In 
1855 he was married to Ann C. Houston, of Pennsylvania ; 
of Welch and Irish descent. Children : William B., Sadie, 
Silas, Frank, EUa, Delia, Alverda, Dessie and Delton. 
Stone and brick mason ; been in Tucker since 1871: ; at 
present lives in St. George. In 1882 he was a candidate 
for the Legislature, but was not elected. In stone-work he 
has done some large contracts on the Pennsylvania rail- 
roads. 

R. P. Johnson "^-as born in 1821, in Pendleton County, of 
English and Irish descent. Married in 1816 to S. A. White, 
of Randolph. In 1861 his wife died, and he man-ied Provy 
"Watts; he lives 25 miles from St. George on Dry Fork. 
He is constable. Children : Sampson, Sarah E., Elizabeth, 
Susan and Anna. 

Samuel H. Jaz^ies, son of Isaac James, was born in 1854, 
of English descent. Married in 1877 to Delia Y. Hebb, 
daughter of William Hebb ; he lives at Limestone, 10 miles 
from St. George, on a farm. Children : Berlinda, Charles 
W., Bertie B. and Stella F. 



422 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

Thomas J. Jones, of English and German descent, son of 
John Jones, born 1850, was married in ISTi to Virginia 
M., daughter of John White. He farms on Limestone, 5 
miles from St. George ; his farm of 175 acres of land has 11 
acres improved. Children : John U., Etta Margaret Tilden, 
Melissa Eunice, Marcilla V. and McClure Burr. 

L. AV. James is of English descent, lives at Limestone ; 
born 1858, and has taught school three times on certificates 
No. 2 and 3. 

Geouge W. Joxes, son of John Jones, born 1848, in Ran- 
dolphs County; married, 1874, Elvina J., daughter of Theo- 
dore Lipscomb. She died in 1879, and in 1882, he mixrried 
Martha, daughter of John Stemple. Children : Leonora A., 
Artliur C. and Lulu Octavia ; farmer, lives G miles from St. 
George, on Pifer Mountain; owns 122 acres, 25 acres im- 
proved ; has worL'ed considerably at the carpenter trade. 

Daniel Judah, of Virginia, was born 1802, and is of Ger- 
man descent; married Judah McCallister in 1826, whose 
name then became Judah Judah. Judah was working in 
the harvest field on his wedding da}'', and quit work at the 
appointed hour, went to the house, was married and re- 
tured immediately to the field. Children : Mary, Nancy, 
Elizabeth, Sarah and L3'da. He came to West Virginia in 
1834, and lived for a while on Stemple Ridge, and he then 
moved to the farm Avliere S. N. Swisher noAv lives. After 
that he lived nearly ever}' place on Horse Shoe Run. 

ErHRAiM H. James, born 1810, of English descent, was 
married in 1840, to Sarah, daughter of John Dumire ; lives 
on Location, 4 miles from St. George, on a farm of eleven 
acres, with four improved. His wife died in 1879, and he 
married Mrs. Louisa Weese, who died in 1882, and he then 



BRIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 423 

married Mrs. Rntli Lipscomb. Children : Sarali Jane, 
Elizabeth, Catharine, George "\V., S. Loman, Jacob M. and 
Ulysses G. 

Samuel L. James, born 1849, son of E. James ; married 
in 1874, to Jemima, daughter of William Hebb ; lives four 
miles from St. George, on the Location, -where he owns a 
farm of 152 acres, with 70 improved ; is a road surveyor ; 
has five children dead, and one, John F., living. 

John Joxes, born in Maryland, 1821. His parents were 
of German and French descent, from Rockingham County, 
Ya. In 1840, he married Unice DeMoss, of Monongalia 
County. Children : George W., Hannah J., Martha A., 
Thomas J., Henry C. and John E. He is a farmer and has 
lived within a few miles of St. Geroge ever since he was IG 
years old. He was the first justice of the peace of Tucher 
County after its formation. In 18G5, he held the office of 
supervisor, and in 1882 was elected county commissioner. 
In the war he leaned toward the South. Latham took him 
prisoner and carried him to Belington, and held him a few 
days. He was carried to Philippi by Capt Holler, and was 
again released. He was a captain of the Confederate Home 
Guards. He lost a son, James W., in the Confederate ser- 
vice, who was taken sick of a fever brought about b}' over- 
work as a carrier of dispatches, and died near Monterey, on 
the Huttonsville road. His farm of 150 acres is six miles 
west of St. George, in Clover District. 

K. 

J. M. IvNArp was born in 1859, in Upshur County, AV. Va., 
of Irish and German descent. Car]:)enter, owns 100 acres 
of land on Haddix ; been in the count}^ since 1880. 

John W. Keisei^, whose father's baptismal name was 



42:t HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

Resin, was boru iu 1858, in Barbour Conut}^ of German 
descent ; niarried in 1880, to Tobitha C. Phillips ; Farmer 
of 113 acres, 30 acres improved, 7 miles from St. George on 
Clover. 

William A. Knotts, son of Robert Knotts, was born in 
1856. Married Clara B., daughter of S. R. Fansler. He 
lives on Horse Shoe Ran, 5 miles from St. George, and is a 
farmer. Their child's name is Albert C. 

RoBEET K. Knotts, of English descent, son of Robert 
Kotts, born in Marion County, ^Y. Va., in 1818. Married 
in 1840, to Fanu}', daughter of Frederick Harsh, of Preston 
County. Children : Martin Luther, Ellen, John A., James, 
Stephen x\.. and William A. He has 110 acres of improved 
land on a farm of 180 acres. He has been in Tucker since 
1852, and "has held no office, except the plow handles." 

Mr. Knotts began for himself with but little on which to 
go, except health and industry. He commenced in the 
woods, and the first year raised 40 bushels of sound corn, 
and since that time has been selling corn every year. The 
first 3-ear he killed 21 deer within one mile of the house ; 
he generally killed from 10 to 20 a year for 20 years. He 
never hunted except in tbe morning before breakfast. 
Often he would kill two and three and get home in time for 
breakfast; lie sometimes carried venison to West Union 
and sold it. Bear skins were Avorth from $1.50 to $7 each. 
He probably had the most remarkable adventure with 
panthers that was ever in the count}' or State. One Sunday 
morning he went hunting as was his custom, and met three 
pantliors, and lie sliot one dead where it stood. The largest 
of the remaining sat down and Avatclied him until he had 
reloaded. He shot it, but it ran yelling into the woods and 
the other followed it; he reloaded his gun, and presently 



BRIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 425 

the unlmrt beast came galloping back to look for its partner. 
He shot it dead. The one that was wounded also died, 
making three panthers that he killed without moving from 
his tracks. This was his last hunting on the Sabbath day. 

M. L. Knotts, son of R. K. Knotts, was born in 1837, in 
Preston Count_y. In 1859 he married Margaret E., daughter 
of Enos Sell, of Preston County ; he lives 10 miles from St. 
George on Maxwell's Run, where he owns a farm of 168 
acres, 75 of which is under cultivation. He has been a 
hunter, but not so great a one as his father ; he has killed 8 
bears and 1 panther, 11 feet long. Children: John J., 
Enos. E., Fanny E., Mary E., Susan Adaline, Jennie R., 
Laura Belle, and Stella Maud. 

J. Z. T. Keenek was born 1847 in Taylor County ; married 
in 1878 to M. A., daughter of James Miller. He came from 
Ireland, where his father was drowned when the son was 
small. He keeps a boarding house at Dobbin's old hotel, in 
Canada, and lost a leg by a wagon's upsetting, at Mingo 
Flats. 

Joseph Kepner, a shoemaker of St. George, was born in 
Maryland, 1852. In his younger days he lived principally at 
Oakland. In 1876 he married Hellen M. Jones. The next 
year, 1877, he came to St. George. Before that time he 
had worked at his trade in New York and Maryland. Their 
children are : Margaret Jane, Franklin P., Harry G., George 
M., Carrie Adams and Enos Duncan. 

Jasper Kalar, born 1852, son of Jacob Kalar, of German 
descent, lives on Shafer's Fork, 12 miles from St. George; 
married 1872 to Mary Jane, daughter of Jonathan Channel, 
of Taylor County. He owns 201 acres of land, one-fifth of 



42G HISTOKY OF TUCKEK COUNTY. 

it being improved. Cliiklren: HoAvavd D., Olive Blanche, 
Stark F. and Harriet. 

William A. Kalar, born 1849, brother of Jasper Kalar; 
married 1873 to Martha, daughter of Daniel Hart, of Ran- 
dolr)h. Children : Carrie A., Delphia A. and Albert Blaine. 
He is a farmer, living on Shafer's Fork, 12 miles from St. 
George, and owns 75 acres of land with 40 acres improved. 

John Knotts, son of E. K. Knotts, was born in 1841 ; 
married 1862 to Lettie, daughter of George Spesert. Chil- 
dren: Mary I., George "William, Sarah Laverna, Dora Ann 
and Lavina Alice. He is a farmer of 197 acres, with 25 
acres improved, and wdth an orchard of thirty-five apple 
trees, on Hog Back, 12 miles from St. George. He has 
been and still is a successful hunter, having killed many 
deer and bears. 

R. "\V. Knapp, of Pocahontas County, was born in 1831 
and married 1851 to Mary Woodlmll. Children: Delilah 
Margaret, George B., John M., Elmira F., Ida E. C, Olive 
C, Marietta Y., Lorenzo D. He is a farmer of 152 acres, 
with 10 acres improved, six miles from St. George, and was 
in the Union army. 

William E. Eight, born 1856, in Maryland ; married, in 
1880, to Harriet M. Welsh. Children : Elsie EHzabeth, 
Edward Garfield and a baby ; is a farmer, and lives on 
Lead Mine. 

Stephen Knotts lives on Closs Mountain ; born 1851 ; 
married 1870, to Christina Spesert; is a farmer of 118 acres, 
with 12 acres improved. 

Isaac Lipscomb, son of Theodore B., was born 1858. He 
is a farmer, owning 53 acres, and lives 9 miles from St. 
George, on Licking. 



BRIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 427 

James Kisner, born 1849, in Maryland ; married Eliza- 
beth White, who, dying, he married Columbia White, in 
1867 ; has 110 acres of wild land, and 70 acres of improved 
land ; lives G miles from St. George, on Limestone ; has 
been in Tucker since 1872. 

James Knotts, born 1845, sou of R. K. Knotts ; married 
in 1866, to Teena M., daughter of Christian AVillis. Chil- 
dren : William Arnold, Amos and Mary E. He farms 40 
acres of improved land and has 85 acres of woodland on 
Twelve Mile Creek, 13 miles from St. George. He has killed 
four bears, and has had some remarkable fights with them. 

L. 

Stuart S. Lambert, son of James B. Lambert, born 1843, 
in Pendleton County; German descent; married, 1862, 
Emily Nelson, widow of William Nelson, and daughter of 
Catharine Bower. Their children are, Henry C, Susan, 
Emily C, U. S. G., James B., Riley and Etta. He is a far- 
mer, owning 25 acres, with 15 acres improved, on Dry Fork, 
24 miles from St. George; has been in Tucker since 1850. 
He taught one school on a No. 5 certificate ; was enumerator 
of the census in 1880. He was a Union man during the 
war, and was in the troops called the R. R. Guards, under 
General Kelly. He is a minister of the Gospel in the Chris- 
tian Church. 

James B. Lambert, born 1854, son of James H. Lam- 
bert ; married in 1870, to Alice J., daughter of Solomon 
Boner. Children : Laura M., Verna Olive and Walter W. 
He owns 402 arces, 100 acres improved, 24 miles from St. 
George, on Dry Fork. He taught two schools on No. 2 
certificates, and was constable two years. 

James H. Lambert, born 1828, in Pendleton County, 



428 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

brother to Stuart S., married, 1852, to America A., claugliter 
of Catharine Boner. Children : James B., Christopher C, 
Lorenzo D., Nathaniel, Edward, Prosy Ellen, Annie May 
and rioda V. He is a farmer of extensive means ; owns 952 
acres of land, of which 100 is improved; has been in Tuck- 
er since 1876 ; taught several terms of school in Randolph 
County ; was a captain in the Union army, and spent three 
years in the service, mostly in Tucker County. 

Samuel H. Lewis, of Pennsylvania, born 1861 ; came to 
Tucker with C. R. Macomber ; married Ida Harding, daugh- 
ter of Joseph Harding, for whose murder a negro, was 
hanged at Oakland, Md., in 1883. Children : Edna May 
and Stella Pearl ; is a laborer at Thomas. 

Moses Lipscomb, son of James Lipscomb, born 1848, in 
Preston County ; of English descent ; married Mary, daugh- 
ter of Price Montgomery, in 1874. Children : James R,, 
Summers M., George P. and Zora E. C. He lives 8 miles 
from St. George, on a farm of 172 acres, with 3 acres im- 
proved ; is said to be the strongest man in Tucker County. 

David P. Long, son of Jacob H. Long, of English de- 
scent, born 1856, married in 1878 to Ruth, daughter of W. 
W. Hansford. Children : Gertie Lestie and Claudius Wil- 
son. He lives at Fairfax, where he is employed on the 
railroad. 

L. T. Lambert, son of James H. Lambert, was born in 
1863, is a farmer and lives 24 miles from St. George on Dry 
Fork. 

H. C. Lambert, born 1852, son of Stewart S. Lambert, 
lives 20 miles from St. George, on Dry Fork ; he has taught 
two schools with No. 2 certificates. 

A. Y. Lambert, son of James H. Lambert, born 1853; 



BEIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 429 

marriecl 1875 to Perie, claugliter of Jackson Slioouover, of 
Randolph County. He is a farmer, living on Dry Fork, 23 
miles from St. George ; he has taught three schools on No. 
2 certificates, as may be seen by referring to another chap- 
ter of this book. Children : Carrie E., Flora A. and Denver. 

Jeff Lipscomb, son of P. Lipscomb, prosecuting attorney 
for Tucker County, was born October 8, 1862, at Aurora, 
Preston County, and is of German and English descent. He 
has lived in St. George for ten years. Soon after the found- 
ing of The Tucker County Pioneer, he entered that office as a 
devil, and remained at it through storm and calm, and rain 
and shine, for four years. He then went into the Clerk's 
office as a copyist for John J. Adams, and remained at that 
business, though not so steadily, for a year. He attended 
school at odd times all his life; he v/ent to Fairmont with 
the intention of entering the normal school, but he did not 
like the looks of the building, and returned to St. George 
and went to work in the clerk's ofiice. This was his business 
until January, 1884, when he entered into partnership with 
H. and C. H. Maxwell, and bought the Pioneer, and acted 
as editor and business manager until May, 1884, when he 
sold his interest in the paper to Hu Maxwell and retired 
from the business. He then entered business with Van 
Dusen & Co., of New York, as agent for their nurseries, and 
in that work has since been employed. 

Emanuel C. Lipscomb, born 1858, son of G. W. Lipscomb, 
of English and German descent ; married 1884 to Martha 
A., daughter of "William Weaver, of Barbour County. He 
is a farmer, li^dng on Location, 7 miles from St. George, 
with a farm of 143 acres, 30 acres in tillage. 

"William Luzier, of Pennsylvania, born 1840, and mar- 



430 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

ried 18G5, to Mary A. ^Vimer ; came to Tucker in 1880, and 
lias a farm of 150 acres, Avitli 5 acres improyed, six miles 
fi'om St. George, on Location Ridge. He spent one year 
in the Union army, was wounded at Winchester and dis- 
charged from the service. Children: Alvin Y., James E., 
Theodore H., William R., Anna E., Tabithia O., Hestala, 
Charles R., Sarenas B. and Justice. 

Peter W. Lipscomb, son of W. H. Lipscomb, was born in 
1860, and was married in 1882 to Florence, daughter of 
Jacob Dumire, of Limestone. Their child's name is 
William J.; his farm of 117 acres has 90 acres improved, 10 
miles below St. George, on the river. He has taught three 
schools: Macadonia, No, 2, Licking District, and the White 
school. 

Philetus LirscoMB,""'' son of Fieldon Lipscomb, was born 
in Preston County, September 3, 1868. He is of Saxon de- 
scent. The Lipscombs were among the earl}^ settlers of 
Yirginia. He attended nothing but common schools, never 
graduated at any school.t He has taught twenty-one 
schools in Maryland and West Yirginia, nearly all under 
No. 1 certificates. In 1862 he married Anamelia, daughter 
of John Gower, of Garrett County, Md. Children : Jeff, 
Camden, Howard, Florence M. and Lawrence. 

P. Lipscomb commenced the study of the laAV in 1871, 
and the next year was granted license to practice, having 
been examined by Judges Dille and Berkshire. He never 
studied under or recited a lesson to a lawyer in his life. 
As a lawyer he has been successful, having practice not only 
in the Circuit and Supreme Courts of W. Y'a., but also in 



* see History of the St. George Bar In this book. 

tThe Lipscombs came from Europe to Virginia, ihcntc to Monongalia Conuty, W. 
Va.. and thence to Tucker. 



BKIEF BIOGKAPHIES. 431 

Maryland; bis cases have beeu numerous in tlie Circuit 
Courts of Tucker and the adjoining counties. His ability 
sets rather toward criminal practice ; and, his influence over 
juries is plain to be seen. 

He has been an officer of one kind and another nearly 
ever since he came to Tucker County ; he was county su- 
perintendent four years, prosecuting attorney four years, 
commissioner to settle with the sheriff four years, besides 
several minor positions, such as town and cor]poration 
offices and member of the county board of examiners for 
teachers. His war history is not of special importance ; he 
was eighteen days a prisoner having been taken by Reed. 
He owns tracts of land in different parts of the county. 

William H. Lipscomb is of English and German descent, 
born 1829 in Preston County, and married in 1857, to Han- 
nah B., daughter of George E. Adams. Children : Peter 
W., William P., Arthur G., Archibald J., George K., Alice 
E., Sarah E., and Amy May. William H. Lipscomb and 
Thomas P. Hebb are the two best lumbermen and raftsmen 
on the river. They have made it their business for a num- 
ber of years. Lipscomb has been logging for 25 years, but 
has farmed some in the meantime. Some years he rafted 
to the railroad at Ptowlesburg over a iiiiliion feet. 
He came to St. George in 1884, living in property bought 
from H. C. Ptosenberger. In the war he had many narrow 
escapes, although he was not a regular soldier, being a mili- 
tiaman. He was shot at by a whole regiment, because he 
had reported some of their thievery; was an associate in 
the county court, and has been a member of the board of 
education two terms ; is still following his occupation of 
lumbering on the river. 



432 HISTOEY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

Gaeeett J. Long, born in 1834, and died of a cancer, 
after terrible suffering, in 1874. He was the son of James 
Long, and of English descent. He was married in 1856, 
to Edith Corrick, daughter of "William Corrick. His chil- 
dren are, Mary Alice, Sarah Samantha, Eebecca, Nora, So- 
phronia Ann, James, Harriet and Joseph Johnson. His 
account of the war in Tucker County, and particularly that 
relating to the battle of Corrick's Ford, is full and authentic. 
From the first, he took an active part in the war ; was an 
officer of the Confederate Home Guards, until he was taken 
prisoner by Hooton, of Eowlesburg, on a charge of treason 
against the United States. The authorities were several 
times petitioned to liberate him ; he lay in prison three 
months at ^\ heeling, and never recovered from the injury 
which his prison life did him. In 1870, a cancer made its 
appearance on his face, and four years after, he died. 

His wife saw as much, perhaps, of the battle of Corrick's 
Ford as was seen by any one person; her father's house 
was made a hospital for the sick and wounded of both 
sides. After the fight, the Eebel prisoners, thirty or forty 
in all, were taken to the field of battle that they might 
identify the dead. The kitchen was the prison and the 
hospital for the Eebels and the main house for the Yankees. 
General Garnett was carried to the house and laid on a bed. 
He was visited by General Morris, the Union Commander. 
They had been schoolmates together at West Point. The 
Confederate General died in Morris' arms. One Avounded 
Eebel tried to escape in woman's clothes ; but, being de- 
tected, he went back to bed, and remained there, aflfecting 
to be on the point of death. After twelve days the Yankees 
left, and the wounded Eebel got up and went home. He 
was a Virginian. Another Eebel had been badly wounded. 



BKIEF BIOGEAPHIES. 433 

and tliey liad carried liim to the house. He was so con- 
trary that he would have nothing to do with anything that 
a Union man had touched. They brought him a Doctor ; 
but, he being a Yankee, the sick Ptebel wouki not take his 
medicine. They left the stubborn man, and he finally got 
well. He was from Georgia. 

Garrett Long was a member of the M. E. Church, South-, 
and was superintendent of the Alum Hill Sunday-school. 
He was much missed in this field. Since his death there 
has been no clB.ss-meeting or Sunday-school at Alum Hill. 

J. K. LouGHRY, son of Aaron Loughry, of German and 
Irish descent ; was born in 1846, and married in 1807, to 
Nancy E., daughter of A. H. Bowman, of Kowlesburg. Chil- 
dren : James A., Alice V., Claudius A., Maud D., Walton 
H. and Agnes M. He is a farmer and merchant, and lives 
8 miles below St. George ; owns 140 acres of land, of which 
40 acres are improved ; has held several offices, such as 
township registrar, clerk, member of the board of education, 
justice of the peace and postmaster. 

S. V. Loughry, brother of J. K. Loughry, was born in 
1834, and married in 1873, to Jane, daughter of W. L. Biggs. 
Children: J. W. J., Nancy, Mary, Susan, Olive, Joretta, 
Ruth, Hiram, Sarah, Leonora, Victoria, . Samuel P. and 
George S. He is a farmer, living 6 miles below St. George ; 
owns 244 acres of land, of which 40 are improved. 

Adam H. Long, born 1818, the year that his father, John 
H. Long, came to Cheat Eiver from Virginia ; is of English 
and German descent, and was married in 1840, to Nancy 
Hart. She is a daughter of John S. Hart, whose father, 
John Hart, signed the Declaration of Independence. 
Children : John H., Margaret Jane, George B., Susan W., 

!.'S 



434 HISTOKY OF TUCKEK COUNTY. 

Cornelius, Carroll "\Y. and Lacy L. He is a farmer, owning 
131 acres of land, of wliicli 87 acres are improved ; is presi- 
dent of the board of education. 

According to Adam Long's account there were IG Con- 
federates killed at Corrick's Ford. He thinks that the 
Union loss was more ; he was arrested by General Kell}^ 
but his property was not molested. He also says that the 
first settlers on the river were Capt. James Parsons, Sims, 
Benjamin Ruddle and Joseph Hardman. Parsons bought 
Sims to the country, and the Indians killed him. Israel 
Schfeffer, father of Israel Sclnielfer, of King wood, first set- 
tled on Shafer's Fork, and from him it was named ; but, the 
spelling has changed. Haddix Creek was named after the 
first man who lived there. The Moores came to Tucker in 
1820. Barne}' Kiearns, Fansler and Rush were the first 
settlers on Black Fork. Brannon Run, in Holly Meadows, 
was named after John Brannon (not Judge Brannon) who 
was the first man to live there. 

John H. Long, born 1843, son of Adam H. Long, married 
1877 to Sara F. Musto, of Randolph County. Children : 
Howard Clay, AYade and Joy Jane. He is a farmer, living G 
miles from St. George, on a farm containing 81 acres, one- 
fourth improved, and has traveled in the West. 

Stephen M. Lipscomb, son of James Lipscomb, was born 
184G, married 1875 to Margaret Lipscomb. Children : Alex- 
ander D., George Amos and Lyda Catharine ; he is a farmer 
of 70 acres, with 8 acres improved, on Drift Run, 5 miles 
from St. George. 

AYiLLiAM D. Lipscomb {AutoUogmpJiy) : I was born 1810, 
in Preston Count}', am a son of James Lipscomb ; married 
18G1 to Eliza H. Biggs, of Garrett County, Md. I live on 



BEIEF BIOGEAPHIES. 435 

the liead of Hansford Eun, and own the only grist-mill on 
it. I have killed fifteen bears. The biggest one I ever saw 
piled on me. I plugged it to it four times with my butcher 
knife. It scratched my shoulders, but did not do much fur- 
ther injury. A short time afterward I knocked an old bear 
down with a "sang" hoe and took a cub away from her. 
There were two others in a tree near by, biit I could not 
get them. I killed a ferocious big panther on Laurel Hill. 
I went to watch a "lick" for a deer. 1 lay in a root hole 
and a log lay over me. The panther slipped along and got 
on the log over me, not five feet away. I curled my gun up 
and shot the whelp in the bosom. It jumped 90 feet, and 
came down so hard that its feet ran in the ground a foot 
deep, and it stuck fast until I went up and -whipped it to 
death. I killed another panther that had slain 17 dogs, and 
the next day killed another with a little pistol. I killed a 
rattlesnake 9 feet long on Laurel Hill. It had swallowed 
126 ground hogs. I killed 160 rattlesnakes, on Laurel Hill, 
in one day with a club 18 inches long. Another day I killed 
over 300 rattlesnakes with a club 10 inches long. One of 
them had 60 rattles on, and another had 187. I am a curi- 
ous fellow. Whenever I tell a thing the truth has to come. 

Jacob H. Long, son of John Long, of Eandolph, was 
born in 1827 ; is of English and German descent ; married 
Lucinda Parsons, daughter of David Parsons, who was 
killed by a falling tree in 1853. Children : Virginia, David, 
Sarah D., Albert, Thomas, Tazell, Minnie, Grace, Emma, 
Maud, Blanche and Lulu. He is a farmer of 451: acres, 
with 150 acres improved ; was a magistrate in this part of 
Tucker before the formation of the county, and has held 
that office two terms since ; was four years president of the 
county court, and in 1875 was elected to the Legislature, 



436 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

where lie was when the capitol was removed from Wheeling 
to Charleston ; was again, in 1880, elected president of the 
county court by an overwhelming majority ; but the amend- 
ment to the constitution went into effect and did away with 
the office ; was several years commissioner to settle with 
the sheriff, and has been president of the board of educa- 
tion. 

During the war he was taken prisoner and was carried to 
Wheeling, where he lay three months in jail. The charge 
against him was treason ; he was sent to Clarksburg for 
trial, and upon the petition of Captain Hall, got his liberty. 
Pierpont had already appointed him justice of the peace. 
His commission was, however, revoked in a week or two by 
a plot of his enemies. Mr. Long says that a man named 
Moore was the first settler iu the Holly Meadows, and that 
he lived on the Callihan farm. 

William C. Lipscomb, son of Jacob Lipscomb, of Euglish 
and German descent, was born 1863, and is a farmer. In 
1875 he had his back broken by a colt which threw him ; he 
also had his arm broken by falling out of a peach tree, and 
had his throat hurt by a limb against which he rode. 

Aaron Loughry, Sr., was born 1797 in Taylor County, of 
Irish and English descent, and married Nancy Louglny ; he 
v/as in the war of 1812 as a substitute ; he lives near Han- 
nahsville, 6 miles from St. George, and has ten children, as 
follows: Hiram T., Sarah, Aaron, Elizabeth, Margaret, 
Samuel, Susan, Mary Ann, John and Nathan. 

A. J. Loughry, born 1831, married 1853 ; he is a farmer of 
35 acres, with 20 acres improved, 11 miles below St. George. 
Children: William H., Mary C, John W., Nancy S., Mel- 
vina, Charles, Cora, Ma}', Berta Fay. 



BRIEF BIOGEAPHIES. 437 

George Long, father of Abel Long, born 1796 in Pendle- 
ton County ; lie was raised in the town of Franklin, and his 
origin is Irish and French ; married Winnie Nelson, who 
died 1844, or near that time. Their children are Abel, Ab- 
salom, William, Elizabeth and Martha, His father came to 
America with Lafayette, and was with him five years and 
seven months. George Long was in the war of 1812. 

HiKAzyi T. LouGHRY was born in 1830 in Harrison County, 
of Irish and German descent ; he is a son of Aaron Loughry. 

John W. Luzier was born in 1864, in Pennsylvania, and 
is of English descent ; his occupation is farming and lum- 
bering. 

C. C. Lambert, son of James H. Lambert, was born in 
1856 ; he lives on Dry Fork, 23 miles from St. George, and 
is a partner in the store of James H. Lambert & Co. 

N. A. W. Loughry, son of Aaron Loughry, was born in 
1844. In 1867 he married Catharine, daughter of David 
Miller. His farm of 100 acres, 6 miles from St. George, has 
16 acres of cleared land on it. He spent seven months in 
the Union army the last year of the war. Children: 
Nancy Ellen, Aaron D., Thomas A. and Charles E. 

A. W. Love was born in 1839, in Upshur County. Mar- 
ried in 1866 to Sarah V. Bailes. Children: Cordona, 
Lunda and Dorsey. He is a farmer, living on the Mason 
Farm, five miles from St. George, on Location. He was 
formerly a minister of the M. P. Church, and spent one 
year on the St. George circuit. His farm contains 104 
acres with 60 acres improved. 

Charles E. Luzier, son of A. B. Luzier, was born in 
1856; married Anna B., daughter of C. E. Macomber, in 



438 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

1880. Children: Agnes L., Ella B. and E. Burton. His farm 
of 240 acres is on Mill Run, 6 miles from St. George, 
with 40 acres improved. 

George A. Long, sou of Abel Long, lives on Dry Fork, 
18 miles from St. George ; was born in 1849, and married in 
1871, to Mary C. Cunningham, of Randolph County. Chil- 
dren: Cora, Rebice A., Thomas J. and Salie. He is a 
farmer, 

Jacob S. Lambert, son of M. G. Lambert, was born in 
1863 ; married Margaret E., daughter of Daniel L. Dumire, 
of Horse Shoe Run, in 1884. He is a farmer and lives on 
Maxwell's Run, six miles from St. George. 

William D. Losh, son of William D. Losh, was born in 
1840 ; married 1863, to Sarah C, daughter of Levi Hopkins. 
Children: John L., George S., Mary E., David W., Cora A., 
Doll}' M. and M. Jennie. He is a farmer, owning 80 acres, 
40 acres of which he cultivates, on Horse Shoe Run, 6 miles 
from St. George. He joined the Confederate army, and was 
at the second battle of Bull Run, where he was taken pris- 
oner and carried to New York. In a few days he crawled 
by the guards and escaped to Philadelphia, where he 
worked a mouth, and then went to Pittsburgh ; thence to 
Wheeling and home. In a little while he was taken by 
Kelly, and was carried to Grafton and kept there three 
weeks. A second time he escaped and came home. He is 
a brother to John Losh, the great hunter, and has himself 
killed a score of bears. He has made several journeys to 
the West. 

George W. Le.vtherman, of English and German descent, 
and son of John Lewis Leatherman, was born in Hamp- 
shire County, W. Va., in 1835. He is one of three surviving 



BRIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 439 

children. A brother and sister live in Missouri. In 1851 
his father died, and he, with his brother, was left to take 
care of the family. They worked hard, but did not prosper 
as they thought they ought, and they determined to move 
to the West. One of the boj^s went ahead to hunt a place 
and the others followed Avitli wagons loaded with the house- 
hold plunder. They were aiming for Missouri, and the 
journey was frought with difficulties. It •\\as in October, 
and it rained and the roads were nearly impassable. Some 
of the famil}'' took the ague, and the others had an addi- 
tional amount of work to do. They passed through Ohio, 
Indiana into Illinois. It had rained nearly all the time ; 
but when they reached Illinois, the weather became clear, 
and they got along better. Just before the}- reached the 
Mississipi River, their horses broke down, and one of them 
died. "With the remaining they could advance but slowh- ; 
but finally they reached their destination. 

After they reached Missouri, they had much sickness in 
the family . The subject of this sketch lay an invalid all 
winter, and nearly all the next summer. So, in the fall he 
decided to return to W. Ya., and sell the home farm ; he 
came back, but failed to sell it. He remained in the 
vicinity more than a 3'ear, and in that time came to the 
conclusion, since he could not sell the land, that he would 
get married and buy out the other heirs and live on the old 
homestead, which, after all, he considered good enough. 
Thus he did. In 1857 he married Mary S. Whip. 
• They worked hard and got along well enough. When the 
war came on, he was drafted for the Confederate army, but 
it did not suit his inclinations to fight for that side, so he 
went off in a hurry for Indiana, and his wife followed him. 
They did not like it in Indiana, and in the spring of 1862 



4^0 HISTOEY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

cleterminod to coine back to W. Va., and risk the danger 
from the Rebels who might be mad at him ; he came back to 
his farm and was not molested. 

His wife died, and left him with six children to take care 
of ; he kept them together, and continned house-keeping 
until 1877 when he married Catharine Thrush, and old 
school-mate of his. 

His children are : Warren W., John W., Zedekiah A., 
Marj' Elizabeth, George S. and Emma Margaret. 

In 1880 he moved his family to Canaan. He had ex- 
plored the country some time before, and had bought large 
land interests. It was the work of nineteen days to cut a 
road to get his wagons into the country. 

Since then he has prospered in his undertakings, and is 

now near the W. Va. C. & P. R. W. He is a member of the 

German Baptist Church, and is the ordained minister for 

his neighborhood. 

M. 

JosErn Martin, son of John V. M. Martin, born 1821, in 
Preston County; married, 1845, Catharine, daughter of 
John Squires ; farmer, renter, but owns 50 acres in Ran- 
dolph County; lives 7 miles from St. George on Texas 
MoiTutain. Children: Mary A., Hiram, Sarah, Margaret 
C, John T., Asbury, Albert and Samuel. 

Michael Mitchell born 1826, is of English descent, and 
was married in 1849 to Nancy Shaw. They had seven 
children to die within three Aveeks, of diptheria. Their 
remaining children are Simon S. and Harvey. He is a far- 
mer owning 250 acres of land, 80 of which is improved ; 
lives on Texas Mountain, 7 miles from St. George. 

Simon S. Mitchell, son of Michael M., born 1853, mar- 
ried in 1883 to Mrs. E. C. Pitzer, daughter of William 



BRIEF BIOGEAPHIES. 441 

Godwin. By occupation he is a farmer, owning 120 acres, 
15 being improved ; lives 7 miles from St. George, on Texas 
Mountain. 

BoBEET F. Murphy, son of Jonathan Murphy, was born 
in Barbour County. In 1879 he married Keturah, daughter 
of Andrew Pifer. Farmer, owns 40 acres, 15 improved, 
lives 4 miles from St. George on Texas Mountain. 
Children : Delia, Ray and Boyd. 

John Moore, son of S. P. Moore, of English descent, was 
born 1847, in Barbour County ; married 1876, to Esther C, 
daughter of William Pitzer ; he is a farmer of 22 acres, 6 
acres improved, 6 miles from St. George, on Texas Mountain. 
Children: Daniel B., Riley, Godfrey, Samuel P. and 
Martha L. 

Martina Myers, son of Adam Myers, was born in Ran- 
dolph County, 1847; married 1868 to Euhama, daughter of 
John M. Cross ; he is a farmer, 8 miles from St. George, on 
Clover, and owns 117 acres, with 30 acres improved. 

Michael Myers, of German descent, son of Josiah Myers, 
was born 1838 ; married 1872 to Amelia, daughter of John 
Auvil. Children : Jehu W. and Annetta. His farm contains 
900 acres, of wdiich 100 is under cultivation ; he lives three 
miles from St. George on Clover, and is road surveyor ; he 
served three years in the Confederate army under Imboden, 
Wharton, Breckenridge and Early ; he belonged to the 62d 
Ya. Inf., but was mounted most of the time; he fought 
twice at Winchester, and was in the battles of Cold Harbor, 
New Market and others ; he served principally in the Valley 
of Virginia, but was at Richmond. In the war his fortunes 
were varied, he being one of the soldiers that fought through 
the war, and shared in defeats and victories ; he suffered de- 



442 HISTOEY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

feat at Winchester, September 19, and shared a victory at 
New Market. At Gettysburg he was under Early, and he 
considers the battle of Williamsport, Md., a harder engage- 
ment in proportion to the number engaged than that of 
Gettysburg. There were only four men in his company (E), 
that were unhurt, and he was one of them, although he was 
in skirmislies almost every da3^ When he came home on a 
furlough he was betrayed into the hands of Gallion, and 
was sent to Camp Chase, Avhere he suffered as every one 
suffered who got into that prison. Four months were spent 
there and he got his liberty only at the close of the war. 
He is a model citizen, and a man of influence in his neigh- 
borhood. 

Enoch Minear, son of David Minear, was born January 
9, 1799, in St. George ; he has been one of the prominent 
men of the county since its first organization and a score of 
years before. He, like his sons, has been an extensive 
traveler, having visited California several times, been 
through Idaho, Oregon, Mexico, Central America, and 
through several eastern states. He went there after he was 
captured b}- Imboden, to escape the war, as did A. C. 
Minear, also. He was there in 1859, 18G1, 18G4 and 1874.* 

Absalom Mick was born in 1849 in Pendleton, married in 
1868 to Jane Wyatt. Children: Martha E., Joseph, Mary 
J., Mahulda, Albert and Enoch ; he is a farmer and has 
been in Tucker since 1880 ; his farm contains 71 acres, with 
15 acres improved, on Dry Fork, 20 miles from St. George. 
He belonged to the Home Guards during the war. 

Daniel Miller was born in 185G. In 1883 he married 

• A full history of Knock Minear ana the fanaily Is given In another cliapter of this 
book, and, for that reason, nothing more Is given here. 



BEIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 443 

Nancy A., daughter of William Arnold, of Maryland. 
Their child's name is Icy R.; he is a laborer at Thomas. 

Elias Metz, of German descent, son of Peter Metz, of 
Monongalia County, was born 1826 and married 1848 to 
Minerva J., daughter of John Brookhover. Children : Wil- 
liam II., George L., Mary Jane, Lethia Ann, Jefferson D., 
Simon P., Acha Alice, Harriet, John, Leonora, and James 
Ezra. A farm of 294 acres, 150 improved, one and one-half 
miles below St. George, belongs to him. This is the old 
Marsh property, and is the farm owned by Jonathan Minear 
at the time he was killed by the Indians. Metz was in the 
Union service during the war, and has been in Tucker since 
1880. 

J. W. Myees, son of Solomon Myers, born 1862, married 
1884 to Loretta, daughter of Salathiel Phillips, lives 8 miles 
from St. George, on Clover, and is a farmer of 40 acres, with 
8 acres improved. 

David S. Minear, son of Enoch Minear, of German de- 
scent, was born in St. George 1840, and has lived there all 
his life. All the others of the family manifested a strong 
passion for traveling and speculation ; but he remained 
steadily at his work at home. In his life we have no stirring 
stories of adventure, or no narrow escapes from foes and 
storms and floods, as we have in the history of his brothers. 
But, as a citizen, he has done his share for the good of his 
county and State. His life has been that of a farmer, ex- 
cept seven years spent in the merchandise business at St. 
George. He has been an officer frequently. During the war 
he was clerk of the county court. In 1867 he married Mary 
Jane, daughter of William R. Parsons. Their children are : 
Creed W., Joseph P., John W., C. Bruce and Mary Catha- 



444 HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

riue. He owns a large and valuable farm at St. George, 
commencing at the town and extending down tlie river more 
than a mile. It is the land on which stood the fort at St. 
George in 1776, and with the exception of S. E. Parsons' 
farm, is the oldest improvement in the county, and is the 
site of the first j)ermanent settlement in the county. Mi- 
near was not in the regular army during the war, but had 
experience in the fortunes of hostilities, having been taken 
prisoner by the Eebels, and escaped, after being shot at sev- 
eral times. The surroundings of his dw^elling are among 
the most desirable in the county. A fine grove of fruit trees 
and arbors of grapevines surround his house on every side, 
making it in summer a scene of quietness and beauty, that 
has all the advantages of town and the secludedness of the 
country. 

William H. Myeks, son of James Myers, was born in 
1856 at Tunnelton ; married in 1879 to Belle Dora Price, of 
Preston County. Children : Bessie Anna, Herbert Clay and 
Walter Henry ; he is of German descent, and is by trade a 
blacksmith, and lives at St. George. 

Benjamin Myees was born in 1813, in Pennsylvania, 
lives 11 miles from St. George on Mill Eun. He is a far- 
mer. Children: John, Josiah, Martha, Ellen, Barbara, 
Andrew^ Benjamin, Henry, Hester and Morgan. 

James MontgomePiY, son of Price Montgomery, of Irish 
and German descent, was born in 1850. In 1878 he 
married Sarah F., daughter of George Moon of Hampshire 
County ; he is a farmer, and lives 6 miles from St. George, 
on Lipscomb's Ridge. Children : Maud Elizabeth and 
George Wade. 

C. B. MoOEE, born 1851, son of James Moore, lives 10 



BRIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 445 

miles from St. George, on Shafer's Fork, and is of Irisli 
and English descent. His farm contains a certain number 
of acres of land of wliicli 33 J per cent, of {- more tlian one- 
half is improved, and the unimproved is to 5-12 of the im- 
proved as ^ the difference between one-third of the un- 
improved and :|^ of 1^ of the improved is to 2 1-62 acres. 

Joshua Messenger, born 1832, in Preston Count}^, is of 
English descent, and was married, in 1857, to Rebecca 
Lewis, of Preston. Children : Mary J., James E., Sarah E., 
Nettie M. and Charles Albert ; he came to Tucker in 1866, 
and is farming on Shafer's Fork, 9 miles from St. George, 
where he ovms 319 acres of land, 60 acres improved. He 
was in the Union army, but was in no battle. 

"William Marquis was born in 1839, in Preston, of Irish 
descent. In 1865 he was married to Sarah Mason, of Sandy 
Creek, Preston County. Children : Charles, and Zora May. 
He lives on Location 5 miles from St. George, where he has 
281 acres of land, with 75 acres improved ; he has been in 
Tucker since 1882. 

John G. Moore, son of James Moore, was born in 1841, 
on Shafer's Fork, is of Irisli and English descent ; married, 
1873, to Anzina, daughter of George W. Faris, of Randolph 
County. Children : George Harmon, Larkin, Anna Belle, 
Arcilla May, R. W. Eastham and Etta Arina. He is a far- 
mer and stock man, living on Shafer's Fork, 11 miles from 
St. George, and owns 225 acres of land, with 150 improved. 

Stephen Murphy was born 1836, ia Marion County, of 
Irish descent ; married in 1857, to Charity Everit. Children : 
Cleophas, Harbert J., Jirah, Louisa, Eunice, Ellis and Ran- 
dolph. He lives 7 miles from St. George. 

J. D. Metz, son of Elias Metz,born in 1861, in Monongalia 



446 HISTOEY OF TUCKEE COUNTY. 

County ; is a farmer, living two miles from St. George, on 
the farm where the Indians killed Jonathan Minear. 

William Miller, son of James Miller, was born in 1854, 
at Limestone ; married Mary, daughter of Sanford James ; 
is of English descent. He is a farmer, and lives 10 miles 
from St. George, on DogAvood Flats. Children : Ira Blaine 
and baby. 

Albert Miller, son of Dr. J. M. Miller, was born in 1849, 
married Martha, daughter of William White. They have 
six children. 

J. T. Mason, son of Thomas Mason, was born 1844. In 
1877 he married Catharine Hart, of Pennsylvania. They 
have one child whose name is Margaret V. He is a farmer 
of 93 acres, with 40 acres in tillage, on Location, 5 miles 
from St. George ; he was deputy sheriff under his father, 
and was several times member of the teachers' board of ex- 
aminers, and has taught nine terms of school, six of which 
were at Fairview. 

Jonathan Murphy, was born 1834 in Marion County, of 
Irish descent, and married Sarah Jane Mitchell in 1854. 
Their children are : Eobert, Alpheus, Isaac, Anzina E., Sa- 
rah Alice, and Martha Jane. He is a farmer of 100 acres, 
three-fourths improved, in Clover District, 6 miles from St. 
George. 

George A. Mayer, one of the leading merchants of Tucker 
County, was born in Preston (Aurora) 1859, and is a son of 
C. W. Mayer, of Terra Alta. In 1880 he Avas married to 
Virginia Cox, of New Waterford, Ohio. Their child's name 
is Charles W. He attended the district schools most conve- 
nient to his home, and had the benefit of a ten-month term 
at the Piedmont high school. He taught three schools, the 



BRIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 447 

first at William Fansler's in Preston, the second at Red Oak, 
Kingwood District, and the third in Kingwood, assisting 
Prof. Fike in the normal school. When he quit teaching, he 
went into the mercantile business in the firm of C. W. 
Mayer & Son, in 1879, and set up in St. George. In 1884 
he dissolved partnership with his father, and went into busi- 
ness under the firm name of Maj-er & Cupp, in which his 
brother-in-law was his partner. When he came to Tucker 
there was no mercantile business of note carried on in the 
county. Prices were high and uncertain, and the trade was 
very unsteady. He brought the prices down, and revolu- 
tionized the whole trade. In 1881 he built a large store 
and ware rooms on Main street. In 1884 he was nominated 
in the Democratic convention, at St. George, as a candidate 
for clerk of the circuit court. He is a young man of stir- 
ring business qualities. 

Randolph Myers, son of Adam Myers, born 1849, was 
raised by Mathew Wamsley, who lived six miles above Bev- 
erly, but who was taken to Camp Chase, and there died. 
Myers was married, in 1873, to Yilena Wilt. He is a far- 
mer living on the river, one mile from St. George. Chil- 
dren : Wilson, Eda Catharine, Lucy Ann and Edgar. 

D. S. Miller, son of William Miller, born 1842, married 
in 1868 to Abigail Wilt. His farm of 53 acres, with 25 im- 
proved, is 4| miles below St. George. Children, Truman C, 
Columbia A., Peter, Catharine, LleAvella, William, Angeretta 
and Stella. 

Andrew J. Miller, brother of D. S. Miller is eight years 
older, and married four years sooner, and married a sister 
of his brother's wife, Mary Wilt. He farms 40 acres and 
has 57 acres of wild land, on the river 4 miles below St. 



1 



448 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

Georp;e. Children : Cora B., Wilhelmina C, George C, 
Agnes May and baby. 

M. V. Miller, born 1845, in Maryland, of German descent, 
his grand-parents coming from Europe. In 1867 lie was 
married to Sallie A. Griflatli. Children : Oliver C, Thomas 
M., Grace M., Lizzie Pearl, Jennie Gertrude and George 
Lester. In his early life he was a farmer. When he was 
sixteen years of age he joined the Union army. Did his 
first fighting under Milroy and Fremont : he was then 
under Sherdian in the Valley of Virginia, and was in all the 
trouble about Harper's Ferry, and got the full benefit of it. 
He was taken prisoner by Stonewall Jackson, together with 
a large number of others. As he expressed it afterwards : 
" Jackson fixed 20,000 bayonets and charged us. It looked 
like the day of judgment was coming." The next day they 
were parolled and sent to Annapolis, Md., where they re- 
mained six months before they were exchanged. 

After he was exchanged, his service was on the B. ct O. 
R. R., and through Virginia. He was in the battle of 
Frederick Junction, under Lew Wallace, and against Early, 
when he was raiding Maryland. Late in the day the Fed- 
erals gave ground and fell back to Baltimore. After this, he 
was under Sheridan, and had numerous skirmishes. Sin- 
gular as it may seem, this command captured their captors, 
who had taken them at Harper's Ferry, in 1862. The sol- 
diers of the two armies recognized each other. 

From Virginia, Miller was removed to Buckliannon, Up- 
shur County, W. Va., where there was no fighting to do. 
He remained there till the close of the war, 1865. He then 
went to Aurora, Preston County, where he lived a year, and 
came to St. George where he has since lived, following the 



BRIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 449 

work of mechanic, clerk, mercliant, hotel keeper and justice 
of the peace. 

G. T. MoTONY, of French and German descent, was born 
in 1842, in Pocahontas Count}-. "While quite young, he 
was carried by his jiarents into Pendleton Countj-, and re- 
mained there till the commencement of the war. AVhen 
the hostilities came on, he joined tlie Union armv and 
fought in a large number of battles, among ^vliich were 
several in West Virginia. He remained in tlie army up to 
the close of the war, and was in fifteen pitched battles, be- 
sides all the hard fighting in front of Petersburg and Rich- 
mond. He w^as present when Lee surrendered at Appa- 
mattox Court Plouse. After the close of the war, he re- 
turned to Pendleton, and in 1866 married a daughter of A. 
C. Nelson, of that county. Their children are, Maggie, 
Robert and Taliaferro. He came to Tucker in 1882, and 
lives on a farm in Canaan, thirty-tAvo miles from 8t. George. 

RuFUS Maxwell, son of Levi Maxwell, of Lewis County, 
w\as born in October 19, 1828. His ancestors have been in 
America a long time ; but originally were from England 
and Ireland. His father, Levi Maxwell, left Pennsjdvania 
in 1803, that is, when he was fifteen j-ears old, and settled 
in Harrison and subsequently removed to Lewis County, 
w^here he still resides, being now (1884) in his 97tli year. 
His wife was a daughter of Col. John Haymond, of Braxton 
County, and grand-daughter of Col. Benjamin Wilson, the 
Indian fighter. Colonel Wilson w;is an ancestor of the 
present Benjamin Wilson, of Harrison C^ounty. 

Rufus Maxwell worked on the fnrm in his boyhood, as 
did his two brothers, John, afterward a Civil Engineer in 
the location of the B. & O. R. R., and EdAvin, now Jndge 

29 



450 HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

Maxwell, of Clarksburg. His early education was in the 
country schools, Avhicli were then rather acquired poor 
affairs. When he had finished the curriculum of these 
rural acadmeis, he entered Rector College, and finished the 
course in 1840, when he was 21 years of age. 

AVhile in attendance at Rector College he made the ac- 
quaintance of Miss Sarah J. Bonnifield, daughter of Dr. Ar- 
nold Bonnifield, and in 1852, June 1st, they were married. 
Miss Bonnifield had also completed the high school course, 
and was a regular contributor of poetry to the newspapers 
of that time. 

R. Maxwell resided in Lewis County and practiced law 
until June, 1856. In 1855 he was elected associate justice 
of the county court of Lewis County. In 1856 he removed 
to Tucker and assisted in the organization of the covmty, 
and the same year was elected prosecuting attorney. lu 
1860 he was re-elected to the same office and held it until 
his Southern inclinations and the partisan warfare that was 
carried on there rendered it impossible for him to perform 
the duties of the office." 

Rtifus Maxwell has not a lengthy record as a soldier. Ho 
was in neither army. He sympathized with the South, biit 
staid at home, an advocate of peace, to bo gained by arbi- 
tration, if possible. i" While the war was going on, the mur- 

* In June, 1831, Maxwell went to the Court-house to attend what was then called 
the Quarterly Court. The Clerk, two or three jurymen and a few other persons 
having business, waited about the Court-house till late In the afternoon, Avhen the 
presiding justice, George B. See, rode up into tlie Court-yard with a gun on his 
shoulder and follOAved l)y a company of armed men, and said tliat there would be no 
court that day, and probablj' there wotild be no more for a long time. Tl\is was a few 
(lays after tlie " I'liilipifl Kaces,"' as Avas called the evacuation of lliat town, by the 
Virginia troops, wlien Cieueral Kelly came upon them with his terrible host of •' Nine- 
ty nay Men." The Quarterly Court of Tuclcer County has not since met. nor Avas 
there any court of account In Tuclcer during the war. It was "between the lines," 
and both parties seemed willing not to agitate tlie subject of resuming power. Max- 
"well never resumed the practice of law. 

t Early in tl\c war, before gun powder liad been smelt in tlie county, some patriotJc 




RuFUS Maxwell. 



BEIEF BIOGKAPHIES. 451 

der of citizens and the burning of property were of common 
occurrence in our neighboring counties ; but, in Tucker it 
"was not so, although no county, except Pendleton, had a 
fiercer guerrilla warfare than we had. So far as can be as- 
certained, not a drop of citizen blood was shed, or a shingle 
burned, except in honorable fight. For part of this good 
result. Maxwell claims the honor. He advocated that the 
safety of the community depended largely upon the con- 
duct of the people. Those who disturbed no one were not 
apt to be disturbed. Yankees and Rebels lived as neighbors 
and fear and respect kept down the rifle and the fagot. 

Eufus Maxwell's children are, Wilson B., Mary A., D. 
Angelica, Hu, Cyrus H., Thomas E., John F., Levi H., 
Charles J. and Eobert R. He is a farmer living three miles 
east of St. George, with 60 acres of improved and 1200 acres 
of wild lands. He has been county surveyor, county super- 
intendent of schools, and twice elected by Tucker and Ran- 
dolph to the legislature. His election to the legislature 
was in October, 18G5, and he represented the delegate dis- 
trict composed of Randolph and Tucker Counties. That 
legislature met in Wheeling, January, 1866, and was prob- 
ably the most prescriptive legislature that ever met in West 
Yirginia. But Mr. Maxwell steadily opposed the proscrip- 
tive measures, and spoke and voted against the Registration 
Act of that session. Only five members of the House voted 
with him. They were, McCurdy, of Jefferson, T>. J). John- 
sou, of Tyler, Jolin Kellar, of Barbour, Capt. DaniGil, of 
Mason, and Mr. Cooper, of Hampshire. i\_nd later in the 
session Mr. Maxwell voted alone against "The Ninth Ju- 



citlzens betbouglit tiiemselves to org-anize a "Home Guard." Not kno^-lng- exactly 
■wliat it meant, tliey advised Mr. INlaxwell on the sulJject, and asked wliat was the 
duty of a Home Guard. He replied : " Meet occasionally at some appointed place, 
muster up and down the road, boast-that you can whip all the men the enemy ca;! 
send against you, and when the enemy comes, run off and hide."' 



452 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

dicial Circuit Bill," which provided that Judge Nat. Har- 
rison should fill all vacancies occurring in all oflfices in his 
circuit, except members of the legislature. Maxwell says : 

This act was as defiantly aggressive as the registration act, and 
more dangerous to Uberty ; because, without even a plausible 
plea of necessity, it conferred absolute civil power upon a single 
individual, a judicial officer who was not worthy to wear ermine, 
being then under articles of impeachment, and who afterwards re- 
signed to avoid impeachment. 

At the beginning of the session, there were fourteen 
avowed Conservatives in the House, but when this " Circuit 
Bill" came up on its passage, Maxwell was the only one 
who was in the front opposing it. His course in the legis- 
lature met the approval of his constituents, but the Consti- 
tution of West Virginia, then in force, provided that 
Tucker and Randolph counties should together elect one 
delegate, who for three terms should be a resident of 
Randolph County and for one term a resident of Tucker 
County. The election being held annually, and Mr. Max- 
well being a resident of Tucker, he was not eligible to a 
seat in the House again until 1869 ; and in October of that 
year he was again elected by a large majority. 

He took an active part in the campaign that year for the 
election of members of the legislature. At that time there 
had sprung up, in the state, a sort of third party of con- 
siderable strength called Let-up Republicans, who claimed 
that the proper time had come for a modification of the 
laws restricting the right of suffrage, &c., and more particu- 
larly the laws imposing certain civil disabilities. He 
advised against holding a Democratic State Convention that 
year, and insisted that the people of each count}^ and dis- 
trict should conduct the campaign according to the con- 
ditions in each : that there was but one issue involved 



BEIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 453 

that men always vote their sentiments and convictions if 
left free to do so ; and that an aggressive organization of 
the Democratic party at that time would have a tendency 
to drive tlie Let-up Republicans back whence they came. 
This plan of campaign was pretty generally carried out, and 
was to the efifect that, 

Where the Democrats were sure of electing a Senator or a 
member of the House of Delegates, they should quietly agree and 
unite upon and rally in support of the best available Democrat ; 
but, where there existed any reasonable doubt of the success of a 
Democrat, they should withhold their candidate, and encourage 
public discussion as much as possible between the Let-up Republi- 
cans and the Radical Republicans, so that the split between them 
might be widened and deepened, and the antagonistic feelings be 
more intensified between the two wings of the Republican party ; 
and finally, that the Democratic voters should, in such counties 
and districts, rally and concentrate their votes upon the Let-up 
candidate. 

The result was that, when the legislature met in January, 
1870, the Radical Republicans found themselves in a 
minority, in the House of Delegates, for the first time in the 
history of the State ; but they still, for a time, confidently 
claimed the Senate. William M, Welch, a Let-up Rej)ubli- 
can, and delegate from Mineral County, was chosen speaker 
of the House. 

After the meeting of the legislature, Mr. Maxwell went 
immediately to work to ascertain the views of the members 
of the House and Senate with respect to the repeal or 
modification of the various " Iron-clad Test Oaths," and the 
repeal or modification of the Registration Law, and to other 
reforms. In a few days he claimed to know the opinions 
of nearly all the typical members of both Houses. He 
ascertained that the Republicans did not intend to make a 
vigorous defense of their out-posts — the teachers,' attor- 



454 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

1163-8' and suitors' test-oatlis — Init that they intentled to 
defend their citadel — the registration laws and officers' 
test-oaths — to the last extremity. 

It was found that the legislature was composed of live 
distinct j^arties, as follows : Extreme Radical Republicans, 
Radical Republicans, Let-up Republicans, Extreme Demo- 
crats and Moderate or "Policy" Democrats. None of these 
parties or factions could be so clearly distinguished from all 
the others as to enable one to tell the precise personal 
following of each. But, ex-Governor Pierpont was the type 
and apparent leader of the Extreme Radicals ; and Nathan 
Goff, Sr., Avas leader of the more moderate Republicans, 
while W. H. H. Flick, Spencer Dayton and William M. 
Welch were the sachems and chief councilmen of the 
Let-ups. John J. Davis and E. A. Summers were the only 
members of the House that could be strictly classed as Ex- 
treme Democrats, although E. G. Cracraft and John Faris 
voted with the Extreme Democrats and Radical Republi- 
cans against the Flick Amendment. But they did it under 
immediate pressure of a constituency that were looking 
through smoked glasses. Among the Policy Democrats 
were found, Daniel Lamb, Benjamin Smith, Henry G. 
Davis, Henry Brannon, J. M. Jackson and others. But 
they were without any well recognized leader, and only 
their unity of purpose led them to a unity of action. They 
had no caucus after the House was organized, but often 
consulted one with another. 

Soon after the organization, Henry Gr. Davis* suggested that the 
Let-ups should have the honor of bringing forward the reform 
measures, and Ruf us Maxwell added that they should also have the 
honor of defending them, provided they do it in good time and 



• Tlieii a member of the State Senate. 



BRIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 455 

sliai^e. This unwritten and informal understanding on our i^art 
required great dilligence to restrain zealous members from getting 
ahead of their business, by taking the wind out of the Let-up sails. 
But the plan succeeded, at least with all the more important meas- 
ures. 

********* 

"Policy Democrat" was a sort of pet-name among us. We got 
the name thus : One evening Rufus Maxwell was conversing with 
John J. Davis and remarked that the true policy of the Democrats 
was to secure all the reforms possible, and not hazzard much 
grasping after things we could not reach. To this Davis replied, 
Avith sarcastic affability that he didn't go much on Policy Demo- 
crats! that Democracy was founded on eternal principles. When 
this little incident was narrated to Daniel Lamb he laughed -most 
heartily and remarked, "Now is the time for Democrats to have 
a policy and pursue it." This remark was true then Avith regard 
to State politics and has ever since been a living truth with regai-d 
to National politics. 

Wilson B. Maxwell,* son of Rufus Maxwell, was born 
April 17, 1853. In his j^ounger daj's he possessed a most 
prolific imagination. He could imagine anything. He 
never went into the woods, or the orchard or be^'ond the 
yard-fence without having wonders to relate of deer, lions, 
hyenas and gigantic frogs that he had seen while gone. 

Just before McChesne3''s skirmish it was rumored that 
the war was to be one of extermination, and that sixty 
thousand Yankees had been scattered along the B. k O. R. 
R. with instructions to sweep soiitli and destroy everything 
that should fall into their powder. The country was much 
agitated, and young Maxwell, although only eight years old, 
seemed to enter into the general anxiety. So, when his 
mother sent him to the r.pring for a bucket of water he im- 
affined that he saw Yankees. He ran to the house and re- 



see History of the St. George Bar in this boolc. 



456 HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

ported that three soldiers had run down from the hill, stop- 
ped to load their guns, and then advanced toAvard the house. 
His father was reading the newspaper ; but when he heard 
this, he ran into the wheat field and lay liid all day. It is 
needless to say tliat there was probably not a soldier within 
twenty miles. 

During the war, farmers in Tucker did not work much, 
because they did not knoAv at what time their property 
might be destroyed. They aimed to raise only what they 
could use. This seemed to give young Maxwell a distrust 
of farm work ever afterward, and he did not like to buckle 
up fairly and squarely to agricultural drudgery, and, in fact, 
would not do it. Probably he thought that the war might 
flare up again at some unguarded moment and consume the 
work of the farmer, and, therefore, it would be as well to 
wait awhile longer till things should become more settled 
before expending much labor on the farm. 

So, he waited, and along three or four years after the war, 
his two brothers, next younger than him, came to be large 
enough to do something. He assumed control of the farm 
work, and seemed to think that tlie cruel war v/as indeed 
over, and there Ayould be no risk to run now in raisintj a 
crop of corn. After a long siege of it, and not a little help, 
he got the fields plowed, and by the first of June, every hill 
of corn was j)lanted. Now came the plowing and hoeing of 
the corn. A long series of experiments has proven that 
corn must be cultivated or it will throw up the sponge and 
quit growing. So, W. B. decide 1 that his corn must be 
l^lowed and hoed. It had rained a good deal, and the 
fields were tolei-abl^- large, and the corn was soon hidden 
by the weeds. In such a case, three furrows should be run 
for every row, to tear out the Aveeds, and make less work 



BRIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 457 

for those wlio had the hoeing to do. But, young Maxwell 
concluded that two furrows Avere plenty, and in short rows 
one was enough. 

He plowed, and put his two younger brothers, one eight 
and the other six years old, to hoeing, and expected them 
to keep up with the plow. The little rascals didn't half 
work ; but, if they had worked their best, they could not 
have kept up wdtli the plow. The sun was hot, and the 
weeds were rank, and the corn was little, and the clods 
wei-e hard, and, withal, the progress was slow. W. B. 
would get to the field with the old white horse about nine 
o'clock a. m., and b}' making the old horse bend to it he 
would get a couple dozen rows ahead of the boys by the 
time the hottest and laziest part of the afternoon came on. 
Then he would tie the old beast up in the fence corner to 
rest and chew weeds, and he would climb on the fence in 
the cool shade of the butter-nut trees and sit there like the 
lord of creation to watch the boys hoe corn. 

The boys were little, and one was awfully freckled ; but, 
in spite of this, they were full of energy and independence, 
and would not ask for help as long as there w^as any hope of 
pulling through without it : so, they would dig and hoe at 
the weed-infested corn rows until they saw that it w^as im- 
possible to get them all done before dark. Then they 
would suggest to ^Y. B., who had been resting for two 
hours, that it would not be altogether alien to their wishes 
if he would lay hands on a hoe and lend a little assistance. 
But, he would reply by encouraging them to persevere, 
telling them that that was the way he got his start. Thus, 
the sun would go down, leaving ten rows for them to hoe in 
the morning while he was taking his morning nap ; for, he 



458 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

was couscientiously oj^jjosed to getting up before eight 
o'clock. 

When fall came, and the corn was cribbed, it looked like 
a small aggregate; and W. B. conld not understand why 
the crib was not fuller. However, he didn't expect to need 
much of it, as he was going to school. He went to Morgan- 
town to the West Yirginia University, and there fell in with 
J. J. Peterson, of Weston, and there is no telling how they 
planned mischief. Mr. Peterson may have been innocent, 
but it looks as if he had something to do with coaxing 
Maxwell to run away from Morgantown and go to Weston 
to school. At an}^ rate, he very suddenly appeared in 
Weston, and remained there a year or two, coming home 
once or twice to give the boys some advice about the 
farming. When he left Weston, he went to Clarksburg, 
and attended a private school taught by a man named Tur- 
ner. When he left Clarksburg, he did the most of his 
studying at home, out in the fields where the other boys 
were at work. He woiild repeat his old Latin Grammar, 
moneo, moneas, moneat, and tell the boys it meant, "mow 
weeds, mow grass, mow hay." 

Thus the summer seemed to pass beautifully over him, 
and he gained a great deal of agricultural knowledge from 
his books. From the Georgics and Bucolics of Yirgil he 
learned how to trim apple trees, plant grape vines, take care 
of horses and sheep, and he always told the other boys how 
to do it. From Horace, Juvinal and Quintilian he learned 
how to arrange words in sentences, and he told the boys, 
and it was a great encouragement to them as they dug away 
at the work and listened with all the patience of Job for the 
dinner horn. 

W. B. Maxwell's talents seemed to fit him better for the 



BEIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 459 

profession of the lawtliaufor anything else, and accordingly, 
he commenced reading in 1873. In 1874 he was examined 
before Judges Lewis, Brannon and Huffman, and obtaired 
license to practice. He located in St. George, and has 
since lived there, and has had a constantly growing practice. 
He is local counsel for the W. Va. C. & P. R. W. Co., the 
managers of which are Henry G. Davis, James G. Blaine, 
William Windom, and others. He has been county 
superintendent of Tucker. 

In 1876 he was married to Miss Caroline Howell Lindsay, 
of Madison, Indiana. Their children are Claud, Bessie 
and Hu. 

Hu Maxwell, (see Appendix). 

Cyrus H. Maxwell, son of Rufus Maxwell, was born in 
1863. At the age of thirteen he went to Philadelphia to 
get his first rudiments of education regarding the world at 
large. After his return, the same year, he attended the 
country school at Low Gap, where he manifested a predis- 
position to take exceptions to every species of instruction 
that the teacher could devise or offer. His progress, how- 
ever, was well enough, and in 1879, at sixteen, he entered 
the Weston Academy, and commenced the studies of the 
higher mathematics and Latin. In these his progress was 
only tolerably rapid. He found Ccesar and the Calculus 
much harder than Geography and Spelling; and, after a 
hard winter of study, and not many pages gone over to show 
for it, he left Weston and returned home to work on the 
farm. In the fall of 1880 he returned to Weston and again 
set toward his studies. But, the next fall, some little 
unpleasantness, for which, no doubt, he was mostly respon- 
sible, having arisen in the school, and also partly influenced 



460 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

by other considerations, lie quit the Academy forever. He 
taught school four months on Smith's Run, in Lewis County, 
and in the spring of 1882 went to the normal school at 
Valparaiso, Indiana. Everything seemed to go against him 
there. He got the diptheria and was laid up awhile wdth 
that. Then he got the mumps, and lost more time. Scarcly 
was he able to be about when he was taken with the 
measles, and had another hard time. To add to his calam- 
ities, some scamp stole his money, and he was left short in 
that respect. He began to grow tired of the place ; and, 
collecting together what plunder he had left, he took the 
train for Chicago, in search of a better land. He was now 
nineteen years of age. His stay in Chicago was short, only 
a few hours, and when next heard of he was harvesting in 
the wheat fields of California. This work was too hard 
to suit him, and he hunted a vacant school and taught 
eight months, at $60 per month. 

In the spring of 1883 he was joined in California by his 
brother Hu, and a series of trampings and wanderings was 
the result. They spent the summer visiting and exploring 
noted places on the Pacific coast, and places of wildness 
and romance among the deserts and mountains. They 
spent a month among the glades and snows of the Sierras, 
and explored the mysterious abyss of Nihilvideo, a report of 
which was published in The WJieeling Intelligencer. In 
July they crossed the deserts about Lake Tulare, and passed 
through the Avernal by night, having gone fifty-six miles 
over the burning sand without water, and reached the head 
of the Cholame River, in San Luis Obispo. After several 
days the Pacific Ocean was reached at San Luis Bay. They 
followed down the coast one hundred and ten miles to Santa 
Barbara, visiting, in the meantime, the wonderful Gaviota 



BKIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 461 

Pass, and Los Critas River, that flows sulpliur water. The 
groves and gardens about Santa Barbara were the beaiiti- 
fulest they had seen in CaHfornia, except about Los Angeles. 
But a spirit of adventure came near spoiling it all. Having 
hired a fishing-boat, " The Ocean King of San Diego," they 
resolved to have a sail, and in company with Bob Shelton, a 
young Kentuckian, two run-away boys from Iowa, one 
Spaniard, Chromo, and an Italian, Larco, they set sail from 
the Harbor of Santa Barbara, on the morning of August 4, 
1883. It was a beautiful morning, and a gentle breeze was 
blowing, as they stood from the harbor. They passed the 
light-hous.e some miles west of the city, and struck boldly 
off across the ocean toward Japan. About noon a storm 
came on and the boat vvas driven before it for six hours. The 
ocean was very rough, and the boat was almost helpless, 
and lay on its side. About six o'clock in the evening it was 
driven on the Santa Barbara Islands, one hundred and fifty 
miles from San Diego. The party reached the shore in a 
skiff that had been tied on the deck of the fishing boat. 

Only a limited quantity of provisions had been gotten 
ashore, and the wild foxes ran down from the mountains 
and eat part of that, so the supply only lasted about one 
meal. Two fish were caught and eaten and some cactus- 
apples were picked along the cliffs. On the third day the 
Spaniard caught a wild sheep among the mountains, and the 
whole party feasted, except Hu Maxwell, who was too con- 
trary to eat mutton, and went without anything to eat until 
a boat picked them up and carried them back to the Cali- 
fornia coast, on the third night. After this the three boys 
went up the coast three Inmdred miles to Monterey, and 
from thence passed up the Pajaro Rio and crossed the Coast 
Mountains to San Luis Rancho and were aQ;ain in the 



462 HISTOKY OF TUCKEK COUNTY. 

Sau Joaquin Valley, one hundred miles from Fresno, 
the starting point. The way was mostly across a life- 
less desert, without water, trees or grass. Soon the 
horses gave out, and they were left in the care of the Ken- 
tuckian and the two Maxwell boys set forward on foot for 
Fresno. They had as proyision, two biscuits, three potatoes 
and a quart of water in a canteen. They guided their course 
at night by the north star, and at day by the sun. The way 
was across a sandy desert, level as a floor, on which at day 
the mirage hid every object from view, and the scorching 
sun made the desert like a furnace. After two nights and a 
day they reached their destination. The hot sand had burnt 
their feet into blisters, and it was weeks before tllGy recov- 
ered from the eifects of the thrist, hunger and hardships of 
the desert. It was man}'' days before the Kentuckian got 
out, but he saved the carriage and horses. The journey all 
in all, from leaving Fresno till returning to it was over 1,000 
miles, and more than 300 miles of it through deserts. 

Not long after this, Hu left California, and C. H. Maxwell 
was again alone there. But he did not stay long. He 
taught a school at $75 a month, and upon its close returned, 
at the age of 21, to West Virginia, where he and liis brother 
Hu bought the Tucker County Pioneer, and went into a part- 
nership to publish the History of Tucker Count}-. 

The remaining live boys of Hufus Maxwell's family are 
young, the oldest, T. E. Maxwell being nineteen, and a 
school teacher ; the next younger, John F., is a. student at 
Weston, and is a landscape painter. L. H, and C. J. are 
school boys and printers, and E. E., the youngest, digs 
weeds out of the garden. 

J. L. Neste];, son of Nathaniel Nestor, boi'n 1802, mar- 



BKIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 463 

ried, in 1882, to Sevana J., daughter of William Fitz water. 
By occupation lie is a farmer, owns 30 acres of land, 10 
acres improved, 4^ miles from St. George, on Bull Run. 
Children : Icy V. and Minnie O. 

Nathaniel Nestee, son of Samuel N., born 1833, was 
married, in 1861, to Melvina, daughter of J. W. S. Phillips. 
First wife died in 1875, and as a second wife lie married 
Bede C, daugliter of Moses Phillips. By occupation lie is 
a farmer, owning 300 acres, 40 acres improved ; 4 miles west 
of St. George. His children are : Isaiali L., Albert E., 
Lemuel A. W., Bueiia Yista, Sampson F., Dorcas F., 
Saberna and Walter. 

George M. Nestee, sou of David Nester, was born in 1818 ; 
of German descent; married in 1848 to Eliza, daughter of 
Oliver Shurtleff. His wife died in 1871, and he married 
Mrs. Lyda Hovatter, daugliter of Isaac Godwin ; is a farmer, 4 
miles from St. George, on Bull Run ; has 70 acres of improved 
land, on a farm of 142 acres. At the commencement of the 
war he was elected justice of the peace, but would not serve. 
He was twice arrested by the Yankees. Jolm, Samuel and 
George Nester were the first settlers on Bull Run. The}' 
killed ten bears soon after they settled there. George Nes- 
ter's children are Doctor L., Oliver D., Marcellus C, Mary 
M., Herschel M., Claudius B. M., Sarali L., Byron AV. and 
Lloyd ^Y. 

Geosge H. Nestee, of German descent, was born in 1846 ; 
is a son of John D. In 1871 he married Jane, daughter of 
Stephen E. Poling ; his Avife died in 1874, and four years 
later he married Savilla Y., daughter of Samuel Gainer, of 
Preston Comity. Farmer and shoemaker, owns G8 acres of 
land, 20 of which is improved ; lives 8 miles west from St. 



464 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

George ; his present wife taught schools No. 1 and 5, Lick- 
ing District, on a No. 2 certificate. Children : Simon P., 
John, Samuel and A. Mac3\ 

John D. Nestee, son of David Nester, was born in 1821 ; 
married in 1843 to Margaret, daughter of George C. Goff; 
is of German descent ; is a practical surveyor, and was 
County Surveyor 10 years ; owns 206 acres of land, and has 
60 under improvement, 5 miles west from St. George ; was 
County Commissioner one year. Capt. Hall took him pris- 
oner and held him five weeks during the war; settled in 
Licking District in 1855, and killed four bears in one day. 
Children: David K., George G., Winfield Scott, Amacy S. 
and Mary S. 

D. S. Nester, son of Jacob Nester, was born in 1851,' and, 
like the rest of the name in that region, is of German de- 
scent and a farmer ; he owns 149 acres, 109 of v/hicli is wild 
land ; he lives on Bull Run, 5 miles from St. George, and is 
surveyor of roads. His children are Ira F., Flora M. and 
Lumma E. 

John H. Nestek, son of Samuel N., of Barbour county, 
was born in 1841 ; married in 1865 to Margaret Sears. 
Farmer of 70 acres, 40 acres improved ; lives 6 miles from 
St. George, on Bull Run. When he was six years old he 
killed a wild cat with a seng hoe. Children : Andrew J., 
E. Catherine, Lyda Y., Martha J., Jasper R., Lavina F., 
Oscar, Solomon and Lawson. 

Eli Nine, of German descent, son of John Nine, was born 
in 1844, in Preston County ; married in 1872 to Margaret 
Weaver, of Preston County. Children : Earnest and Ellis. 
He is a farmer living in Canaan. His farm of 110 acres is 
all wild land but 9 acres. He has traveled to some extent, 



BRIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 465 

having visited Nebraska, Kansas, Indian Territory, Texas, 
Minnesota, Wisconsin, Dakota, Illinois, Iowa, Missouri, 
Indiana, Ohio, Arkansas^ Tennessee, Kentucky, Michigan 
and Virginia. He practiced medicine in Missouri. He be- 
longs to the Homeopathic school. 

Herschel M. Nester, son of G. M. Nester, born 1858, 
and lived 4 miles below St. George. In 1882 he married 
Almeda Dumire, of Black Fork. 

"W. Scott Nester, born in 1851, is of German descent ; 
he married Mary, daughter of Levi Hill, and his children 
are: Jacob A., Ledora A., David W., Ida S., Martha A. 
and James AV. He owns 700 acres of land on Hile Run, 
nine miles from St. George. He is a farmer, carpenter, 
blacksmith and surgeon. 

o 

John O'Day, born in Ireland, 1856, and raised in London; 
married Mary A. Healey, Texas, Md. Children : Andora 
Alice and Margaret Eliza. By trade he is a boiler-maker, 
but is keeping a boarding house on the West Virginia Cen- 
tral and Pittsburgh Railway. 

J. S. Otes, living on the railroad near Thomas, was born 
1859, and is of German and Irish descent. By trade he is 
a carpenter. 

p 

Andrew S. Phillips, born 1857, son of Elijah Phillips ; 
was married in 1875, to Alice S. Nester. Their children 
are Prissilla, Sarah, Milla, Bedford and Dicy May ; owns a 
farm of 96 acres, with 35 acres improved ; lives 10 miles 
from St. George, on Indian Fork of Clover. 

William S. Phillips, born 1852, son of J. W. S. Phillips ; 
married in 1870 to Sarah M., daughter of Jacob J. Nester; 

30 



466 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

cliildren : Matliew B., Arnold W., Jacob J., Bertlia J., J. 
Elwood and baby ; is a farmer owning 110 acres, with 50 
acres improved. He lives 8 miles from St. George, on 
Clover. 

Elijah Phillips, son of Isaac Phillips, born 1821, in 
Barbour County. At the age of 20 lie married Louisa H., 
daughter of John Valentine. Their children are, Isaac J., 
Absalom, Almarine, John W., Jane, Andrews, Sylvenas and 
John. He has been a prominent man in the county since 
its formation. He came to Tucker in 1830, and has since 
been a farmer and merchant. He owns 212 acres of land 
100 acres of which is improved. He lives on Brushy Fork, 
10 miles from St. George. 

Sylvenas Phillips, son of Elijah Phillips; bom 1859, 
and married in 1880 to Mary J., daughter of R. T. Griffith. 
Children : Florida, Cora May and Bertha. By occupation 
he is a farmer and owns 162 acres of land, 50 acres of which 
is improved. He lives 10 miles from St. George. 

James R. Phillips, son of Eli Phillips, born 1835, in 
Barbour County, of English descent; married in 1859 to 
Ellen, daughter of William Phillips. Children : Angerretta, 
Franklin, Letcher, Truman and Cora. His wife died in 
1871, and in 1872 he married Abagail, daughter of AYaldo 
J. Bennett, of Barbour Count3\ He is a farmer of 41 acres 
of land, with 30 acres improved ; been in Tucker County 
since 1883. His second family of children are Burnetta, 
Robert D., Emerson, Roxa N., Hider M. and Dora A.; lives 
six miles from St. George, on Texas Mountain. 

IsitAEL Phillips, son of John J. Phillips, born 1816, in Bar- 
bour County, of French and German descent; married in 
1837 to Sarah, daughter of Moses Kittle. Elihu Phillips 



BEIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 467 

is tlieir son. He is a farmer of 200 acres, with 70 acres im- 
proved ; lives 7 miles from St. George, on Texas Mountain ; 
was justice of the peace 4 years, sheriff 4 years, and has 
been a member of the board of education. 

Elihu Phillips, born 1838, married in 1858 to Martha 
Yoakam ; lives on a farm 7 miles west of St. George ; was 
postmaster for 30 years, and held the office of secretary of 
the board of education. Children : Salina E., Mary A., 
Nancy E., Eachel A., Eliza O. and Sarah J. 

Aknold Phillips, son of J. W. S. Phillips, of English de- 
scent, was married to Emily A. Yoakam. His farm of 131 
acres, 60 of which is improved, is 9 miles from St. George, 
on Brushy Fork. Children : John L., Yirginia, Jehu, Irwin, 
Coleman B., Idela and Stella J. 

John L. Phillips, son of Arnold Phillips, was born in 
1863 ; owns 39 acres of land, 15 improved, 9 miles from St. 
George ; is a school teacher, on a No. 2 certificate, having 
taught schools Nos. 4, 5 and 7, Clover District. 

Isaac Poling was born in 1860 ; married, 1883, to Eena 
M., daughter of H. W. Shahan ; he is a farmer and lives on 
Licking, 8 miles from St. George. 

J. M. PiTZEE, son of J. M. Pitzer, was born 1853 in Bar- 
bour County ; married, in 1883, to Margaret C, daughter of 
Joseph Martin ; lives 7 miles from St. George, on Licking. 
He has but one child, Lodema. 

"\A ILLIAM Plum, born 1848 in Preston County, of English 
descent ; married, in 1871, to Sarah A., daughter of Martin 
S. Stemple ; he is a farmer, blacksmith and carpenter ; his 
farm of 137 acres is one-fifth improved ; lives 10 miles from 
St. George on Long Run. Children : Martha A., Tabitha 
E. and Harry M. He has been in Tucker since 1878. 



468 HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

D. S. PiFEK, son of Andrew Pifer, of German descent, was 
born in 1855 ; married in 1875 to Sarah, daughter of Jacob 
Shafer. In 1878 his wife died, and the next year he mar- 
ried Mattie, daughter of Joshua Shahan, of Preston County. 
His farm is on Texas Mountain, 5 miles from St. George, 
and contains 68 acres, 50 of M'hich is improved. Children : 
Verna and Claudius. 

CoURTLAND Phillips, SOU of Jeliorali Phillips, of Barbour 
County, was born in 1842, and married in 1869 to Manda, 
daughter of Simeon Harris. His children are, Loretta H., 
Gilbert L., Malissa O., GinnieD., Ira E, and Icson J,; his 
farm of 100 acres, with 15 acres improved, is 12 miles from 
St. George, on Haddix. He did four years of service in 
the Confederate army, under Edward Johnson, Stonewall 
Jaekson and General Early, He was at Winchester at the 
time of Banks' defeat, was in the battles of Cold Harbor, 
Gettysburg (where he was wounded), was captured and 
sent as a prisoner to David's Island, N. Y.; was sent home 
on parole and exchanged. He was also in the fight at Fair 
Oaks, Mechanicsville, Fredericksburg, Bull Run, German- 
town and Strasburg. He was twice a prisoner, and suffered 
8 months imprisonment at Point Lookout, Md. 

Wesley PniLLirs, son of Elijah Phillips, born 1850; mar- 
ried in 1869 to Lucinda Yoakam ; is a farmer of 79 acres, 
35 improved, 10 miles from St. George on Clover. Children : 
John M. R., Elijah, Mary Ann, Uriah and Eliza. 

Isaac Phillips, brother to Wesley, and 8 years older, and 
married 7 years sooner to Melvina, daughter of Samuel Stal- 
naker, lives on Clover, 10 miles from St. George, on a farm 
of 145 acres, 40 acres improved. Children : Truman A., 
Luisa Belle, Marietta, Sylvester, Almarine and Savilla. 



BEIEF BIOGEAPHIES. 469 

Marion Phillips, son of Moses Phillips, was born 1852, 
and married at the age of 20 to Martha A., daughter of John 
Jones. He lives 4 miles from St. George, on Clover, and 
has 25 acres of cleared land, and 50 acres of woods. He 
was constable 8 years. Children : Eunice L., Tasy C, 
Henrietta, Joy D. and Zalma. 

Absalom Phillips, Elijah's son, was born in 1844 ; mar- 
ried in 1868 to Louisa M., daughter of William Jefferies ; 
farmer of 70 acres, 25 acres improved, on Clover, 10 miles 
from St. George ; also in the mercantile business. Melissa 
is his only child. 

Albert G. Phillips was born in Barbour County in 1841; 
married in 1865 to Almarine, daughter of Elijah Phillips. 
Children : Elijah, Jerome, Celia, Dama and Martha J.; 
farmer of 102 acres, 30 acres improved, 7 miles from St. 
George, on Clover. He was in the Confederate army, and 
passed through a number of battles iinhurt, although his 
clothes were cut seven times by bullets. He was with 
Garnett at Corrick's Ford, and was in the battle of Gettys- 
burg and on James River. 

Hamilton Poling, son of Samuel Poling, was born in 1840 ; 
married Elizabeth, daughter of John Eamsey, of Barbour 
County, 7 miles from St. George ; is a farmer of 100 acres, 
with 20 of it in shape for farming. He has been in the 
county since 1882. Children : Phillip, Martha, John W., 
Samuel E., Sarah F. and Margaret J. 

Salathiel Phillips, son of Jacob P., of Barbour County, 
was born in 1831, married in 1854, to Anice, daughter of 
Eli Phillips. In 1864 his wife died, and the next year he 
married Elizabeth J. Hewit. Ten acres of his farm of 73 
acres is under cultivation, and is 7 miles from St. George, 



470 HISTORY OF TUCKEE COUNTY. 

on Clover Run. He came to Tiicker when 3 years of age. 
Children : Mary C, Loretta J., Savilla R., Emily M., James 
A., Robert E. and Margaret O. 

Robert PniLLirs, son of Jacob Phillips, was born in 1826, 
of German descent. In 1847 he married Malissa, daughter 
of John Valentine, of Barbour County ; lives 6 miles from 
St. George on Clover. His farm of 50 acres contains 47 
acres of wild land. He has been road surveyor 20 years, 
member board of education 18 years. He killed a bear 
when he was only 12 years old, by shooting it in the throat ; 
has killed more than 200 deer. He was Captain of 
militia before the war. Their children are, Anna, Mette C, 
Malinda J. and John Riley. 

Moses PniLLirs, son of Isaac Phillips, was born in Bar- 
bour County, January 19, 1830. When he was 16 he came 
to Tucker, and lived in a house that had no floor, door, 
chimney or window. A log was cut off, and the family 
crept in at this hole. In 1851 he married Lamira, daughter 
of William Phillips. Children': Marion J., Bede, Catharine, 
Barbara M., Columbia J., Melvina, Laura E., Abraham F., 
Adaline and M. C. Bernard. He owns a farm of 100 acres, 
60 is cleared land, 5 miles from St. George, on Texas Moun- 
tain. He was eight years justice of the peace. During the 
war his sj-mpathies leaned toward the South, and in McChes- 
ney's raid, Phillips was one of the fifty infantry that followed 
toward Hannahsville, but who did not arrive in time to take 
part in the fight. He saw the battle of Corrick's Ford, but 
was not in it."' . 

Isaac Phillips was born 1804 in Barbour Count}-, was a 
son of Joseph Phillips, and was of English and Dutch de- 



*See previous chapters of this book for other matters relating to Moses Phillips. 



BRIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 471 

scent. He came to Tucker in 1836, and was the first settler 
in Clover District. He was in the Corrick's Ford battle, 
and saw the whole affair. It was his opinion that many 
Union men were killed. He is one of the oldest citizens of 
the county, and one of the pioneers. His children are: 
Elijah, Enoch, Diana, Christina, Moses, Barbara, Aaron, 
George W., Samuel H., John and Eliza Jane. 

P. J. Phillips, son of Jackson Phillips, was born 1853, 
married 1875 to Malinda J., daughter of Robert Phillips. 
He is a farmer with 10 acres of cleared land on a farm of 
62 acres, 10 miles from St. George, on Clover. His children 
are Nily M., Adaline F., Charles J., and Alba J. 

Leonard PiiiLLirs, son of John W. S. Phillips, born 1845, 
in Barbour Count}-; married 1865 to Hannah J., daughter of 
John Jones. Children : Lavina Ann, John Jones W. S., 
Mary E., Richard C, Martha A., James M. and Thomas W. 
H.; lives on Brushy Fork, 9 miles from St. George, on a farm 
of 54 acres, with 20 acres improved. He has been road sur- 
veyor, overseer of the poor and president of the board of 
education. He served two years in the Confederate army, 
under Imboden, Fitz Hugh Lee, Jackson and others. He 
was in the battle of Gettysburg and Williamsport. At Wil- 
liamsport his regiment suffered terribly. Of 1100 who went 
into the fight, only 250 could be found able to bear arms 
when the battle was over. Phillips became separated from 
his men, and a compau}^ of cavalry charged on him. He 
flung himself in a fence corner and opened fire on the ap- 
proaching enemy, who fired in return, knocking thousands 
of splinters from the rails all about him. He fired eight 
times, and held them in check until reinforcements came to 
his rescue. At Gettysburg he was in the hottest fight, and 



1 



472 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

saw 600 wagons hauling wounded men to the rear. He was 
with Imboden in some of his most daring raids. In theone 
down Gauley River, Phillips went six days with only one 
meal, and that scanty. It rained on them at night, and Phil- 
lips lay on Ioav ground with his blanket over him. So 
fatigued was he that he did not awaken until the water was 
nearly over him. Then he got up and sat on a log till morn- 
ing. In the war he never shrunk from an undertaking, no 
matter how hard or dangerous. 

Magaega Paesons, son of Thomas S. Parsons, born 1858, 
married 1883 to Florence E., daughter of Hu P. Collet ; lives 
on a farm 11 miles from St. George, on Black Fork ; his farm 
contains 95 acres, of which 15 acres is improved. He is 
overseer of poor. 

Adonijah PniLLirs, born 1829, in Barbour County; mar- 
ried 1849 to EHzabeth, daughter of Jacob Phillips; lives 
on a farm 12 miles up the river from St. George. Children : 
Mary, Samuel E., Minerva, Catherine, Thomas J. and 
Amanda. 

Nathaniel Pennington was born 1829 in Pendleton 
County, of English descent ; married 1861 to Susan, daughter 
of Solomon Carr ; farmer of 200 acres, 50 acres improved ; 
lives 14 miles from St. George on Red Ran ; belonged to 
the Home Guards during the war. Children : Solomon, 
John, Nathaniel J., Esau, Adam, Robert H., E. Elizabeth, 
Catharine and Martin. 

John Pennington, son of Nathaniel Pennington, was born 
in 1860, was married in 1878 to Mary H., daughter of D. S. 
Hern, of Greenbrier County. Children : Samuel S. and 
Luella. 



BEIEF BIOGKAPHIES. 473 

Solomon J. Pennington, brother to John, born 1856, 
married Phoebe C. Hartley, of Pendleton County, lives on a 
farm 19 miles from St. George, on Dry Fork. Children : 
Oliver, Zella, Mary and Martha. 

Hiram Phillips was [^born in 1826, in Barbour, son of 
William Phillips ; lives on a farm of 165 acres, with 60 
acres improved, on Black Fork, 7 miles from St. George ; 
been in the county since 1849, and has caught two bears. 
In 1849, he married Mary, daughter of Sarah Sargent, of 
Preston County. Children : Sarah M., Susan E., William 
L., Henry G., James A., Harriett, Draper C, Teretha, Anna 
F., Walter C, Ida J. and Haymond H.; he works in the 
cooper business to some entent. 

Samuel L. Phillips, son of Adonijah Phillips, was born 
1852 ; married 1877 to Minerva Weese, of Randolph. He is 
a farmer, living on rented land, 5 miles from St. George, on 
Wolf Eun. Children : Floyd, Plumber B., William Cayton 
Democrat and Olive B. 

A. J. Pase was born in 1863, in Pennsylvania ; been in 
Tucker since 1879 ; son of Jacob Pase, lives at Thomas, 15 
miles from St. George ; he is a laborer. 

S. T. PuRKEY was born in 1848 in Barbour County, son of 
L. A. Purkey, of German descent. Children : Frank, 
Charles, Samuel Tilden and Lulu B. In 1871 he married 
Sarah C. Ash ; he was formerly a shoemaker, but is now a 
farmer, living 6 miles from St. George, on Location Ridge, 
where he owns 185 acres of land, of which 35 acres is 
under cultivation ; lived ten years in St. George ; was ap- 
pointed and then elected constable, was member of the 
board of education, road surveyor and overseer of the 
poor, and deputy sheriff under A. C. Minear. In his 



1 



474 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

younger days lie was passionately fond of driving cattle, 
and in that occupation traveled over a large portion of the 
State. 

S. J. Parsons was born in 1848, in the Horse Shoe, is a 
son of James W. Parsons, of English descent. In 1869 he 
married Emma Parsons, daughter of Squire Job Parsons. 
Children : Prentis M., Hattie, Arthur Wilbur and Marvin ; 
is a farmer, living one-half mile east of St. George, and has 
100 acres of land well improved, and 300 not so well culti- 
vated. He was one of the best hunters in the count}'-, while 
he followed the sport. He, C. L. and S. E. Parsons, killed 
31 deer in the fall of 1870. 

He met with an accident while hunting, and which came 
near ending fatally. He, with C. L. Parsons, was hunting 
on the bluff near Sims' Bottom, and he accidently fell over 
a cliff; fell 85 feet at two falls, on sharp rocks, and then 
rolled 200 feet further into the river. He was uncon- 
scious from the first and has no recollection of the 
occurrence. 

C. L. Parsons, was born in 1811; married in 1877 to Sadie, 
daughter of J. M. Jenkins. Children : Boyd M., Bertie R. 
and Delton. He is a farmer, living 3 miles from St. George, 
on Jonathan Run, on a farm of IGO acres, of which 70 acres 
is improved. He lost his left arm in 1874, in a threshing 
machine. He was one of S. J. Parsons' comrades tlie fall 
that 31 deer were killed. He was with him when he fell 
over the cliff, and he saved him from drowning. 

Joseph Parsons, son of William R. Parsons, and owner of 
the old Horse Shoe Farm, was born in 1842 and married in 
1872 to Margaret J., daughter of Adam H. Long. Children : 
William R., Florence M., Minnie and Bascom. Mr. Parsons 



BRIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 475 

is one of the most extensive farmers in the county. He has 
500 acres under improvement, and nearly that much unim- 
proved; lives in the Horse Shoe, three miles from St. 
George. He attended the West Virginia University 8 
months, was county superintendent one term and county 
surveyor two terms. During the war he was taken prisoner 
by Kelly and carried to Wheeling, but was soon liberated. 
He was a school teacher in his younger days. 

I. C. Poling was born in 1850 in Barbour County, son of 
Israel Poling, of English, Irish and German descent ; married 
in 1870 to Anna, daughter of Robert Phillips. Children: 
Fannie B., John W., Ida M. and Laura Etta ; is a farmer, 
owning 63 acres, 7 acres improved, 6 miles from St. George, 
on Clover Run. He has been in Tucker since 1868. 

Henry G. Phillips, son of Hiram Phillips, was born in 
1855, married in 1881 to Winnie A. Somerfield, of Randolph 
County. Children : Granville T. and Hiram J. He lives 
10 miles from St. George, on Black Fork. 

William R. Phares, was born in 1854, son of J. W. Phares, 
of Randolph County, of Irish and German descent ; married 
in 1878 to Phoebe F., daughter of Solomon Ferguson. Chil- 
dren : William H., John F. and Mary J.; farmer of 150 
acres, 30 acres improved, on Clover Run, 8 miles from St. 
George. He has been in Tucker since 1881. 

Levi H. Pase, of Pennsylvania, was born in 1857, son of 
Jacob Pase, of German descent ; married, 1883, to Lizzie, 
daughter of Joseph Miller ; he has one child, William H., 
and lives at Thomas. 

George W. Pase, son of Jacob Pase, of Pennsylvania, 
born, 1856 ; married, 1881, to Margaret Mullenax ; he lives 



476 HISTOEY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

at Thomas, and is a laborer in tlie mines and on the rail- 
road. Their child's name is Maud. 

Frank Pifer, son of Andrew Pifer, was born 1852. He 
is of German descent, and is a mechanic and farmer ; spent 
several years in the city of Parkersburg, and in 1880 went 
West to Kansas City and stayed a few days. He has trav- 
eled to a considerable extent over the States east of the 
Missouri River. 

A. B. Parsons,* son of W. W. Parsons, born 1844, of 
English descent; married Rachael, daughter of W. R. 
Parsons. In his early life he followed farming, then school 
teaching and then the profession of the law. He has been 
school commissioner, secretary of the board of education, 
county surveyor and prosecuting attorney ; was a mem- 
ber of the St. George town council, and held other small 
offices ; was elected prosecuting attorney in 1876. In 
1882 he was elected to represent Tucker and Randolph in 
the legislature. He is a Democrat, and is a prominent 
leader of the factional politics of his county. He owns 
property in different parts of the county, and has valuable 
lots and houses in St. George, where he resides. 

S. E. Phillips, born 1860, son of J. U. S. Phillips, of 
English descent ; married, 1878, to Mary E., daughter of 
Wesley Channel ; is a farmer, owning 47 acres of land. 
Children : Hattie M., Risse, Zona Jane, and James Elliott. 

S. E. Parsons, son of J. W. Parsons, was born 1838 in the 
Horse Shoe where he now resides, near the site of the old 
stockade fort of Indian times. He is a descendent of the 
Parsonses who first came to the Horse Shoe. Capt. James 

• See History of the St. George Bar, In this book, for further notice of Mr. Parsons. 



BEIEF BIOGEAPHIES. 477 

Parsons, the ancestor of one branch of the family, was mar- 
ried several times. The last marriage was when he was 
near 80 years of age. Dr. Solomon Parsons was a son of 
James Parsons by this last marriage. Dr. Solomon was the 
grandfather of S. E. Parsons. 

S. E. Parsons was married 1864 to Adaline Parsons. His 
children are : Etta Irene, Edgar J., and James M. He is a 
farmer and stockman. His Horse Shoe farm is the oldest 
and one of the very finest in the county. Part of it has 
been under cultivation over one hundred years. It contains 
174 acres, of which 150 acres is highly improved. His resi- 
dence stands on an elevation overlooking the river bottoms 
on three sides, and on the fourth side, half mile away, rises 
the high ridge, called Sims' Mountain. The spot is one of 
great beauty. The Horse Shoe is seen in all its greeness in 
the summer time, and fine farms extend on every side. 
Besides his Horse Shoe farm, he has nearly 4000 acres of 
land, some wild and some improved, in different parts of 
the county. He has always been a man of influence in the 
county, having been justice 7 years, commissioner of schools 
several years, president of the county court four years, and 
held other offices of trust and profit. In the war he was a 
supporter of the Union cause. The men who came with 
McChesney, took him prisoner as they returned, after Mc- 
Chesney had been killed. They took him to Rich Mountain, 
and when Garnett retreated, he carried Parsons along, hav- 
ing tied him and William Hebb together. The night that 
the army passed up Hog Back, Parsons untied himself and 
leaped over a bank to escape. Several shots were dis- 
charged at him, but he escaped. He belonged to no military 
organization during the war. He lives three miles from St. 
George. 



478 HISTOEY OF TUCKEK COUNTY. 

C. S. Parsons, brother of A. B. Parsons, of St. George, 
was born in 1845, and married in 187G to Sarah E. Miller, 
daughter of David Miller. Children : Leland W. and 
Hester A. He is a farmer and lives four miles from St. 
George, on a farm of 67 acres, with 40 acres improved. 

Jesse Parsons, son of W. E. Parsons, was born in 1825, 
and in 1847 married Catharine, daughter of Solomon Par- 
sons. Children : William L., Mary Samantha, Eliza, George 
T. and Melvin W. ; is a farmer and owns 532 acres of land, 
with 80 acres improved, four miles above St. George, in the 
lower part of the Holly Meadows ; he was the first sheriff of 
Tucker County, having been elected twice in the same year 
to that office. In the war he was southern in his inclina- 
tions, and he was taken prisoner by Nathaniel Lambert 
and was carried to "Wheeling on some pretended charge. 
After he had lain in jail one day, he was sent home, to be 
again arrested by Frank Purinton. This time he was taken 
to Clarksburg, and had to lie in jail five days. 

Job Parsons is a son of Solomon Parsons, and was born 
in 1820. In 1841 he married Jemima AVard, daughter of 
Adonijah "Ward; his wife died in 1853 and he married 
Eunice J., daughter of James Long, in 1872. Children : 
Analiza, Martha Jane, Solomon A., James "W., Mary 
Jemima, Alice, "Ward and Perry. He lives in the Holly 
Meadows, 6 miles from St. George, where he owns 700 
acres of land, of which 160 acres is under cultivation. He 
has been a county officer and held office in Eandolph 
before the formation of Tucker ; he says that quite a num- 
ber of wounded Union soldiers were in "Washington Par- 
sons' house after the battle of Corrick's Ford, which goes 
to substantiate the belief that their loss was greater than 
their account makes it. 



BEIEF BIOGKAPHIES. 479 

Waiid Pahsons, born 1827, son of Solomon Parsons, 
was married 1848 to Sarali H., daughter of William E. Par- 
sons. Children : Lloyd, Bnrnitte, Carrie, Elizabeth and 
Lemuel ^Y. He is a farmer, living on Shafer's Fork, 8 miles 
from St. George. His farm of 1000 acres has 375 acres im- 
proved. His personal property was all destroyed by Yan- 
kees during the war, and 100 of Latham's men tried to cap- 
ture him, shooting at him, and the balls throwing sand over 
him. He was elected sheriff in 1876. 

Geokge M. Parsons, son of Isaac Parsons, was born in 
1800. When he was 21 years of age he walked to Ohio 
with William Losh, Nicholas Parsons and Daniel Du- 
mire.* He crossed the Ohio at Sistersville. He remained 
6 months, got the ague and came back. He went again, on 
horseback, in 1844. He owns 1600 acres of land, with 
400 acres improved. He lives at the mouth of Coburn 
Kun, 5 miles from St. George. He and N. M. Parsons are 
in partnership. 

James D. Propst, son of W. H. Propst, born 1852 in Green- 
brier County, of English and German descent ; married 1875 
to Eliza A., daughter of Thomas J. Bright. He owns 
50 acres of land, half improved, 14 miles above St. George. 
Children : Austin H., and Kosa Dell. 

Tpiomas Parsons, born 1834, died 1873, son of James Par- 
sons. His farm of 330 acres was in the Holly Meadows, 
5 miles from St. George. Children: Signora D,, Magarga, 
Isabel, Cj'rus Haymond, Rufus Maxwell, Irona Jane and 
Bebecca E. 

James R. Parsons, born 1814, 4 miles from St. George ; 
married 1837 to Mahala, daughter of Joshua Mason. Chil- 

* See anotlaer chapter of this book. 



480 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

dren : Cornelius, Susana, Marsilla, Nancy, Luther, Joshua, 
Thomas, Robert, Harriet and Emil}^ He is a farmer living 
14 miles from St. George on Shafer's Fork. He owns 345 
acres of land, of which 150 acres is improved. While Tucker 
belonged to Randolph he was justice four years and consta- 
ble eleven years. 

William H. Propst, of Bath County, Va., was born 1822, 
and is of German and Irish descent ; married 1844 to Ellen 
Hiser, of Greenbrier County. Children : Elizabeth, Jane, 
Thomas P., James D., George L. P., Alfred F. and Charles 
W. He is a farmer of 75 acres, one-third improved, on 
Pleasant Run, 12 miles from St. George. He was in the 
service of the Southern Confederacy, in the shoemaking 
department. 

George L. P. Propst, son of William, was born iu 1859. 
In 1876 he married Angelina, daughter of John M. Hans- 
ford; he is a farmer, living 12 miles from St. George. 
Children : Emma Catharine, Julia Ann, John H. and 
Alonso B. 

Thomas P. Propst was born in '1850, in Greenbrier 
County. In 1877 he married Virginia M., daughter of 
Thomas J. Bright. Children : Charles W., Mary E. and 
James M. T.; he is a farmer and school teacher, and owns 
109 acres of land on Pleasant Run, and has taught three 
schools. 

Thomas B. Parsons, son of James R. Parsons, was born 
iu 1849. In 1874 he married Hannah Channel, of Barbour 
County. Children : Cornelius S., Jasper K. aud Upton G.; 
he is a farmer and blacksmith, with 400 acres of land, one- 
fourth improved, on Shafer's Fork, 14 miles from St. George. 

J. W. PiFER, son of Andrew Pifer, was born in 1861 ; he 
is a farmer and mail-carrier. 



BEIEF BIOGEAPHIES. 481 

Nicholas M. Paesons was born in 1812, at tlie mouth 
of Coburn Eun, where he has ever smce lived. His 
ancestry were the same family who first came from Moore- 
field to Tucker ; he owns about 1600 acres of land. In 
1882 he married Eegana Teeter. Their child's name is 
George J. 

Lloyd Parsons, born 1848, at Ahim Hill ; married, 1872, 
to Anna C, daughter of AVilliam Hansford, of Black Fork ; 
was constable at one time. His farm of 244 acres on Shaf- 
er's Fork, has twenty acres improved. 

A. S. PiFEE, born, 1863, on Pifer Mountain, is a son of 
Andrew Pifer, of German descent, and is a farmer and mail 
carrier. 

Jacob Pennnigton, born, 1849, in Eandolph County, of 
German and Irish descent ; married in 1869 to Mary J., 
daughter of John G. Johnson, of Lewis County. Children : 
George W., Jarratt H., Minnie, A. Bennett and Job Par- 
sons. He worked at the silversmith trade in Weston, under 
Er. Ealston, and also under Lambrach, of Cincinnati. He 
came to Tucker in 1880, and now owns a farm of 418 acres 
on Eed Creek, 28 miles from St. George. 

Jacob Pase was born in Pennsylvania, and is of German 
descent ; was married in Pennsylvania. Children : Geo. 
W., Levi H., Ames M.,* John H., Andrew J., Jacob O., 
Amanda M., Lavina J., Eliza J. and Sarah S.; he lives at 
Thomas, and his house was the first one there. 

John. I. Propst, of German, descent, was born 1824 in 
Highland County, Va., and was married in 1846 to Delila 
McClung, of Greenbrier County. He and his wife weredi- 

* Ames M. Pase died 1883 of lock jaw, caused by a severe cut on tlie foot, received 
wltli a broad-axe, while hewing logs for a house. 
31 



1 



482 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

voiced in 1850, and lie married Elizabeth Eurgitson, widow 
of Ellis Furguson, of Randolph County. His second wife 
died 1881 and he married Mary, widow of Samuel Kaler. 
Children : Hiram, Clorinda C, and John E. He has been 
in Tucker since 1859, having come from Greenbrier County ; 
lives 8 miles above St. George and has 139 acres of land, 
one-half tilled ; is overseer of the poor and member of the 
board of education. He has killed eight bears. With one 
he had a remarkable fight, hand to paw, and after shooting 
the bear, and pounding it generally, it fled and left him mas- 
ter of the field. 

John E. PiiorsT, son of the foregoing, lives 8 miles from 
St. George, near his father's. He Avas born in 1859. 

A. C. Powell, born in 1849, of German descent, was 
married in 1879 to Elizabeth, daughter of Johnson Goff. 
Children : Sarah V., Mary A., Nancy F., Nettie, Dellie 
May, Myrta and Rosa Lee. His farm of 30 acres, 8 miles 
below St.. George, has 8 acres improved. He was in the 
Confederate army three years, and was in a battle where 
old Ben Butler tried to storm the entrenchment, but failed 
to accomj)lish anytMng. After he left the Confederate army 
lie entered the Union army and served six months. He Avas 
in no general battle, but had a ball shot through his arm, 
and his coat cut ofl:" by a saber. 

Haymond H. Phillips was born in 1865. In 1882, at the 
age of 17, he married Floyd Helmick, of the Sugar Lands, 
aged 15. They ran off to Maryland and got married. 

I. W. Poling was l)orn in 18G4 ; is a son of Albert Poling • 
is a farmer and lives 4 miles from St. George on Clover Run. 

Job Parsons, generally known by the name of " 'Squire 
Job," was born in Tucker County in 1789, and died iu 1883. 





P Lipscomb 



Jeff Lipscomb, 





A. T BONNIFIELD. 



■Job Parsons 



BEIEF BIOGEAPHIES. 483 

He was a remarkable man in more wa^'s than one. He 
possessed a powerful constitution, and he seemed capable of 
enduring almost anything. His weight was 250 pounds, 
and there was not on him a pound of superjBuous flesh. In 
the "War of 1812 he was a soldier, and was sent to the North 
"West to fight the Indians. He was at Fort Meigs and at 
other posts throughout that country; and when the war 
was over, he returned to his home in Tucker. His prin- 
cipal occupation was farming, although he engaged in 
stock-raising, merchandising and in running a grist-mill. 
He lived in the Holly Meadows, and Job's Ford is named 
from him. His farm was called the" Job Place," and is that 
now owned by the Swisher Brothers; 

As a second wife, he married Sarah Losli, daughter of 
Stephen Losh, and raised a large family of respected chil- 
dren. His house was open with its hospitalities to all ; 
and, the traveler whose good fortune brought him to that 
door at night, was always received with welcome, and in 
the morning, there was not a cent to pay. Parsons was a 
great lover of hunting, and always kept a large pack of 
hounds. It was his delight to hear them cross the distant 
mountains, deeply baying on the trail of a deer. Such 
sport was formerly much indulged in by the people along 
the river. Numerous hounds were trained to hunt down 
the deer and chase them to the river, where tlie}^ were shot 
by hunters with long-ranged rifles. A deer-hunt was the 
occasion for the manifestation of the fullest spirit of sport. 
No sooner had 

The deep-mouthed bloodhound's heavy bay 
Resounded up the rocky way 

Than the whole country along the river was in commotion, 
horsemen mounting in hot haste and galloping oft' to inter- 



484 HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

cept the deer in its passage of tlie river. The whole time, 
from the fii'st cry of the hounds at early morn nntil the 
chase ended by the death of the deer, often at evening, was 
one continuous train of excitement and pleasure, surely not 
less than that of the high-born Englishmen, -who go wild 
over a fox chase, or kill thousands of dollars worth of 
horses to catch a hare. 

But, the days of this kind of hunting in Tucker are about 
numbered. The bay of the hounds is seldom heard any 
more, and many of the old hunters are passed away, some 
to distant countries and some to that mysterious realm 
whence none ever return. 

When the civil war came on, Job Parsons was a warm 
sympathizer with the South, and never let pass an opportu- 
nity of expressing his preference. In consequence, he was 
much annoyed during the war, by such petty leaders as 
Hall, Latham and Kellogg. His property was destroyed or 
carried off, and himself was made to submit to indignities 
from the guerrilla soldiery who boasted that they were sav- 
ing the Union. If saving the Union must be done by tor- 
menting as good a citizen as Job Parsons, it might be 
questioned whether it deserved saving. The fact that his 
house was open to all was made a reason for persecuting 
him. He kept Rebels whenever they wanted to be kept, 
and did the same for the Yankees, although it was hard to 
extend to them as hearty a welcome. The last night of 
Lieutenant McChesney's life was spent in Job Parsons' 
house. 

After Imboden's second raid, the Union troops sent up 
from Eowlesburg failed to find an}* of the Rebels who had 
paroled Hall, and thought to get something of satisfaction 
by carrying off tlio property of those citizens Avho sympa- 



BEIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 485 

tliized witli the Soutli. As Job Parsons was well known to 
be southern in his proclivities, his property was not safe, 
and he knew it. When he learned that the Yankees were 
coming, he caught up some of the best of his horses and 
hurried them off to a hiding place, near the Yellow Eock, 
along the river between Job's Ford and Alum Hill. Scarcely 
had he reached the place of concealment when he was seen 
by Yankees, who peered through spy glasses to search out 
every nook and corner of the woods. They saw the horses 
and started for them. He was by his ]3roperty, and had his 
old hunting rifle with him. When he heard the foot-falls of 
some one passing over the rocks, he was on the alert, and 
when the blue coats were seen filing up the path, he threw 
his rifle to his shoulder, and in a stentorian voice, called : 
" Halt !" The Yankees stopped and stood like cowards until 
he again spoke to them, when they mustered up courage 
to ask him who he was. He told them, and they at once 
took him prisoner and captured his horses. They disarmed 
him, and made him walk before, while they rode the horses. 
When they reached his home, they ordered dinner, and af- 
ter they had eaten, they proceeded to St. George, still car- 
rying away the horses and taking him as a prisoner. 

He walked in front of the soldiers, until the indignities 
which they heaped upon him became greater than he could 
bear. Suddenly wheeling in the road, he poured upon them 
a tirade of invectives, telling them that he had fought the 
British to make this country free, and now that freedom 
was denied him. They were making light of his words, 
when he showed himself in earnest by snatching up a stone. 
They saw the movement, and leaped from their horses to 
avoid it. He advanced with deliberation and mounted one 



486 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

of the horses and rode off, leaving the unhorsed man to tod- 
dle along on foot. 

Job Parsons died in the winter of 1883, and was biu'ied at 
St. George. 

R. 

Joshua Robinson, son of John O. Robinson, was born in 
1834, and in 1864 was married to Elizabeth, daughter of 
Jacob Spangler. Children : Mary L., Sarah E., Jacob H., 
Noah A., Flora D., Manda J. and Laura A. He is a farmer, 
blacksmith and merchant ; lives 9 miles below St. George, on 
Louse Camp, where he owns 50 acres of improved and 59 
of unimproved land. 

He was in the Hannahsville skirmish, where McChesuey 
was killed. He was at the river on the morning of June 29, 
1861, shooting fish, and was arrested by Captain Miller, 
who was dressed in A. H. Bowman's " every-day " clothes. 
Robinson was pressed into service, and made to do duty as 
a guard ; he was in the midst of the fight and saw one 
man's brains shot out, but was himself unhurt. 

G. W. Shoemaker, of Irish and English descent, son of 
John Shoemaker, of Randolph, was born in 1861. In 1880 
he married Barbara, daughter of Jacob Myers. Children : 
Annie E. and Henry C; lives 3 miles from St. George, on 
Clover. 

Andrew Rosier, born 1863, married 1882 to Catharine 
Croston. 

Absalom Rosier, born 1848, manied 1874 to C. C, daugh- 
ter of John O. Smith ; rents land 9 miles fi-om St. George, 
on Clover. Children : Thomas H., Lafayette, Mary and 
Jennie. 

David E. Root, son of George Root, of Preston, of Ger- 



BRIEF BIOGEAPHIES. 487 

man descent, born 1847; married 1872 to Margaret, daughter 
of David Closs ; lives on a farm of IGO acres, of wliich 60 
acres is improved, 10 miles from St. George on Closs 
Mountain. Children: John, George E., Duncan, "William, 
David and Agnes. He has been in Tucker since 1872, and 
followed the blacksmith trade several years, but is now 
a farmer. 

Owen Riordan, whose name occurs in this book in the 
history of the W. Va. and Pittsburg R. R., was born in the 
County of Cork, in Ireland, 1826, and came to America in 
1854. He has spent the greater portion of his time among 
the mines of Maryland, of which State he has been a resi- 
dent until quite recently. He now lives in Tucker County. 
He commenced as a coal digger, and raised from one posi- 
tion to another until he became inspection of mines. He 
was elected justice of the peace, and served one year ; but 
a change in the politics of Maryland required all officers to 
swear to support certain doctrine which Riordan refused to 
do, and resigned. He was afterwards appointed justice and 
served 12 years. In 1865, he was appointed Registrar of 
votes, and in 1867 was made mine manager of the Atlantic 
Company ; had charge of the inside works of mines for 12 
years. In 1868 he was appointed mine inspector of Marj^- 
land — a State office, and served two years. In 1880 he was 
emploj'ed by Senator H. G. Davis to prospect the various 
counties of West Virginia for minerals ; has been engaged 
in this more or less since. In 1884 he was appointed Supt. 
of the mines of the W. Ya. C. and P. R. R. 

In 1854 he married Hannah Sheehan, of Ireland. Child- 
ren : Mary, Michael, Ellen, Joseph, Eugene and Anna. 

A. L. Rogers, of English descent, from Rockbridge 
Countv, Ya., was born in 1856. In 1877 he married Mattie 



488 HISTOKY OF TUCKEK COUNTY. 

Robinso]!, of Lis native county. Children : Girtlia M., 
Amos Asliby and Oscar U.; is a sawyer on a steam-mill, 
and owns 250 acres of land in Canaan. 

William Rains, son of Gabriel Rains, was born in 1826, 
in Pendleton County, of Irisli and Englisli descent. In 
181:9 lie married Malinda Hedrick, of Randolph County. 
Children: James R., Catharine, Margaret, Robert L., Ida 
Belle, William, Gilbert and Albert G. He owns 100 acres 
of land OQ Dry Fork, 26 miles from St. George; has 
been in the mercantile business five years, and has been 
post-master at Red Creek the same time ; has been in 
Tucker since 1867, and has been a member of the board of 
education, justice of the peace and county commissioner. 
The latter office he held four years ; is a man of solid 
business qualities, and exerts a good inliuence in his 

neighborhood. 

ji 

C. R. RuFFiN'was born in 1857, in Albemarle County, Va., 
son of F. G. Ruffin, and a lineal descendant of Thomas 
Jefferson. The relation Avas on his mother's side ; was 
raised within four miles of Montecello, the place of Jeffer- 
son's residence. In 1879 he left Yirginia, and went to 
Illinois, where he remained till 1883, when he went to 
Texas, the extreme N. AV. panhandle. He was a vaquerro 
on the ranch of Curtis and Atkinson. They carried 32,000 
cattle on the Deamond Stem Ranch. They had other 
ranches of, perhaps, as many cattle. Ruffin returned to 
Virginia the same year, and in October, 1883, came to 
Canaan to look after the interests of the Canaan Yalley 
Blue Grass and Improvement Company, whose lands 
aggregate 5,000 acres. The Company Mas organized in 
October, 1883, by capitalists of Maryland and Yirginia. 



BEIEF BIOGKAPHIES. 489 

The object is to clear the timber from the whole ranch, and 
make of it a cattle farm. 

C. R. Jtviiffin attended the Potomas Academy at Alexandra 
two years, and the University of Virginia one year. 

G. "NV. Eyan was born in 1855, in Randolph County, is a 
son of John J. Eyan, of Irish, and German descent. In 
1880 he married Burnette, daughter of Ward Parsons. His 
regular business is house painter and paper hanger; for- 
merly lived in St. George, where he held various corpora- 
tion ofl&ces. At present he lives on a farm two miles from 
St. George in the Horse Shoe. 

D. "\Y. Eyan, brother of G. W., was born in Eandolph, in 
1858. In 1882 he married Tabitha, daughter of ^Y. ^Y. Par- 
sons and sister of A. B. Parsons. Eyan lived in Eandolph 
until his 16th year, when he came to Tucker ; is a house 
painter. 

Amby Eains was born in 1843, in Pendleton County, 
brother to "William Eains. In 1868 he married Hannah, 
daughter of Ebenezer Flanagan ; farmer, 25 miles from St. 
George, on Dry Fork, 130 acres, 50 improved. Children : 
Gabriel, Jacob, Martin L., Martha L., Ada E., Carrie and 
Harriet C. 

Elijah Eoy, son of Simon K. Eo}-, born 1859 ; married 
1880, to Martha, daughter of William Flanagan ; lives 28 
miles from St. George, on Dry Fork. Children : J. Madison 
and bab}'. 

Simon K. Eoy, father of Elijah Eoy, of English descent, 
was born 1827 ; married 1849 to Sidney, daughter of John 
Pennington. Children : Melvina, Adam K., Simeon K., 
Elijah, Malissa and Laura ; lives on a farm 28 miles from 
St. George, on Dry Fork. He killed five panthers at one 



490 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

time, as lie reports, and has killed more than a dozen al- 
together. 

Simeon K. Roy, son of the foregoing, born 1855 ; married 
1883 to Edna, daughter of Columbus AYolford, and lives on 
Red Creek, 28 miles from St. George, and owns a farm of 
110 acres, 30 acres of which is improved. 

W. D. Rains, born 1863 in Pendleton Count}', son of 
Phoebe Helmick. He is known by the name of " Billy Bar- 
low," and he lives on the railroad near Fairfax. 

John W. Richards was born 1843 in Harrison County, 
son of William M. Richards, of English and Turkish de- 
scent ; married 1872 to Floried Riley. Children : Earl D., 
Earnest C, Everal W. and Flora. 

Gabriel Rains, born 1808, in Pendleton County, son of 
James Rains, of Irish and English descent ; married 1826 to 
Margaret Lawrence. Children : William, Eli P., Amby and 
Elizabeth ; he lives on Red Creek, 26 miles from St. George. 

James W. Runner, son of Philip Runner, was born 1849 
in Preston County, and was married 1872 to Sarah, daughter 
of William Hovater. Children : Grant, Marcellus, Florence, 
Clara A., Charles, Philip T. and Mary J ; is a farmer of 
92 acres with 23 acres improved ; 8 miles from St. George. 

T. A. Ridenour, born 1863 in Rowlesburg, son of Aaron 
C. Ridenour ; is a rafter on the river, working princi- 
pally with Thomas F. Hebb and William H. Lipscomb, the 
two most noted rafters on the river. 

Eli p. Rains, son of Gabriel Rains, was born 1829 in Pen- 
dleton, County, and married 1857 to Malinda White. Chil- 
dren : Isaiah A. and Rebecca Susan ; owns 139 acres of 
land with 50 acres tilled, 20 miles from St. George, on Dry 



BRIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 491 

Fork. He belonged to the Home Guards during the war. 

John Roth was born in Germany in 1819, and in 1833 
sailed for America. After eight weeks on the ocean, he 
landed in Baltimore. He worked at various occupations 
the first years after he landed, until, in 1842, he married 
Maria Frederick, of Germany. Children : Margaret Ann, 
Martha Ehzabeth, Louisa, Sophia, Sarah, Emma, Almeda 
and William ; his wife died, 1879, and in 1880 he was mar- 
ried to Mrs. Elizabeth, widow of Andrew Pifer. He farmed 
twenty-three years in the Glades, and then came to St. 
George and opened a dry goods store. 

s. 

William F. Shahan was born in 1852, in Preston County, 
and married in 1879, M. L., daughter of Samuel Nester ; has 
been in Tucker since 1872, and lives on a rented farm in 
Licking District, 9 miles from St. George. Children : 
Louisa C. C. and Sarah E. 

John A. Stlt^l, of German descent, and a son of James 
Stull, was born in 1851, and in 1873 he married Lyda, 
daughter of Samuel Nester ; has 10 acres of cleared land on 
a farm of 123 acres, five miles from St. George, on Bull 
Run. He has been in Tucker since 1871, and is road sur- 
veyor. Children : Sarah E., Florence B., Winfield C, R. 
B., Sriver and Sabina J. 

Andkew Shafer son of William Shafer, was born in 1853, 
and married in 1877 to Martha A. Bolyard, of Preston County. 
Children : Olive, Walter, Nora, Bertha and Tasker. Far- 
mer, 81 acres, 50 acres improved, and lives 7 miles from St. 
George, on Brushy Fork. 

Jacob P. Shafer son of William P., was born in 1847, in 
Barbour County. In 1868 he married Catharine J., 



m 



492 HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

daughter of John Varner. Farmer, 200 acres, 50 acres im- 
proved, lives 9 miles from St. George, on Brushy Fork. 
Children : Leonard, Isaac See, Sarah M. and William S. 

Adam Shafeu, of German descent, son of Jacob P., was 
born in 1822 on the ocean. He was married in 1848 in 
Preston County, to Elizabeth, daughter of John M. Pitzer ; 
130 acres of his 200-acre farm is improved. He lives 7 
miles from St. George, on Brushy Fork. Children : John 
"W., Nancy E., Barbara S., George W., Jefferson D., Jenisa 
Ann and William R. 

Henry Shafer was born in 1833, son of J. P. Shafer, of 
Barbour County ; was married in 1852 to Nancy E., 
daughter of J. M. Pitzer. Farmer, of 105 acres with 40 
improved, on Texas Mountain, 6 miles from St. George. 
He has been in Tucker since 1869 and was 2 years road 
surveyor. Children : John M., William B. and Mathew M. 

He was in the Confederate army 12 days ; went home and 
got his leg broken by a kick from a horse. He was also a 
prisoner 12 days in the Union army. His grandfather came 
from Germany, and his father fought in the war of 1812. 

J. E. Shafer, son of Jacob Shafer, was born in 1851. In 
1874 he married Mary C, daughter of Henry Rigaway. He 
farms 30 acres of a 123-acre farm, 5 miles from St. George, 
on Texas Mountain ; was in Missouri six months while 
young, and after he came back, he worked six years on the 
railroad. Children : Willard P., Willis P., Nittie Sibble and 
Paisy.'"' 

Jacob Shafer, son of John P., of Barbour County, was 
born in 1822, and married in 1846 to Juda, daughter of John 
Fitzwater ; is a farmer with 80 acres of cleared land and 28 



The peculiarity of these names Is worthy of local history. 



BRIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 493 

acres of woodland, 6 miles from St. George on Texas Mount- 
ain ; has been in Tucker since 1846 ; was at one time 
captain in a company of militia ; is a member of the M. P. 
Church, and is an exhorter. Children: John W., Mary C, 
Jacob R., Martha S., Annie E., James M. and Albert M. 

John M. Shafer was born in 1856, son of Henry Shafer, 
and is of German descent. In 1884 he married Anzina E., 
daughter of Jonathan Murphy. He is a farmer and school 
teacher. A list of his certificates may be seen by consulting 
another chapter of this book. 

In 1883 he was elected superintendent of schools of 
Tucker County ; lives 6 miles from St George on Texas 
Mountain. 

D. N. Shafer, son of Daniel S., born 1860, married 1882 
to Eliza Belle, daughter of Isaac Phillips. Mary E. is his 
only child. He owns 38 acres of land, 9 miles from St. 
George, on Clover. 

C. J. ScHOONOVER, a farmer living on Cheat River, 14 miles 
above St. George, was born in Randolph County, 1839, being 
a son of Thomas Schoonover. In 1865 he married Susan, 
daughter of James R. Parsons, and she having died in 1870, 
he married, in 1879, Rachael E. Bowman, daughter of Henry 
V. Bowman, who was murdered by Yankees during the war. 
Children : Carl W., Harriet E., James T., Adaline C, A. 
Ward and Sansom C. Mr, Schoonover lived two years mth 
Dr. Bonnifield during the war. 

Henry Snyder, of German and Irish descent, son of John 
Snyder, born in Randolph County, 1849; married,'1870, Mary 
E., daughter of Solomon Boner ; has been in Tucker since 
1877, and owns a farm of 314 acres, 155 improved, on Dry 
Fork, 20 miles from St. George. He was in several skir- 



494 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

mislies during the war, but was unhurt, except by one of 
Ms own men, and when a horse ran over hhu. He was 
elected constable and resigned after one year. Children : 
Clara B., Hulda Jane, John Solomon, Paulina, Martin V., 
Biley B., and baby. 

Isaac Smith, born 1843, in Pendleton County, and mar- 
ried, 1866, to Clorinda, daughter of Joab Carr. He is a 
farmer, 250 acres, 50 acres improved, on Dry Fork, 24 miles 
from St. George ; has been in Tucker since 1877, and has 
been road surveyor ; he taught the Bonner school one term 
on a No. 5 certificate. Children : George W., Sarah E., 
Daniel, Mary Jane, Ida, Margaret, Flora, Abraham L. and 
Charles. He was a soldier in the war, under Col. Latham. 

Thomas E. Shillingburg, born, 1860, in Grant County, of 
German descent, and son of J. W. Shillingburg, is in the 
firm of Shillingburg and Duling ; was married July 4, 188o, 
to Lina Chisholm, of Garrett County, Md. Elmer P., is his 
only child. 

Lewis C. SHiiPFER, born, 1851, in Preston County, son of 
Jacob Shaffer, of German descent, married, 1878, to Sarah 
J., daughter of David Closs. Children : Oscar C, Agnes 
and Mary. He followed the carpenter trade six years, and 
then purchased a farm of 124 acres on Closs Mountain, and 
has since resided there. 

Jacob Shaffer, born, 1825, in Preston Count}-, son of Te- 
walt Shaffer, married, 1850, to Sarah Goff, of Maryland. 
Children : Lewis, George C, and Martha. He is a carpen- 
ter and lives 10 miles from St. George, on Closs Mountain. 

Charles H. Street, born, 1835, in Virginia, of English 
descent ; married, 1853, to Catharine J. Bowman, of Virginia. 
Children : William A., Carrie V., Susan M., Sarah M., and 



BRIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 495 

George L.; has tauglit six schools in Tucker County, all on 
No. 1 certificates. His family live in Barbour. 

George W. Shahan, of Irish descent, born in Preston, 
1830, son of George Shahan. In 1851 he married Luisa 
Hofl'man ; owns 111 acres of land on Licking, and has 20 
acres improA'ed, 8 miles from St. George. He was in the 
Confederate army under Garnett. Children : "William F., 
Minerva, Christiana, Mary C, George E., Richard J., Olive 
J. and Carolina. 

Henry J. Shrader, son of Henry Shrader, of German de- 
scent, was born at- Lead Mine, 1853. In 1881 he married 
Sarah S., daughter of Garrett Long, of Holly Meadows. 
Children: Addie Alma and Lillie Alberta; is the founder 
of -Fairfax, as Eastliam is the founder of Davis ; moved to 
Fairfax March 28, 1883. He is a contractor, overseer and 
manager on the railroad. 

William F. Shahan, born, 1852, son of George Shahan ; 
married to Mitchel Nester in 1880. Children : Louisa and 
Sarah M. His farm contains 111 acres, with 20 acres im- 
proved, 8 miles from St. George, on Licking. 

"\Y. F. Stout, of Harrison County, born, 1859 ; married, 
1883, to Harriet, daughter of Coleman Schoonover ; lives 
two miles below St. George, and follows lumbering as a 
business. 

John A. Shaffer, of Preston County, of German descent, 
was born in 1849 ; married in 1870 to Sophia, daughter 
of John Roth, of Garrett County, Mar^dand. Children : 
Howard C, Faith A., Ethiel H. and Lulu B. He has fol- 
lowed the occupation of farming and merchandising, and is 
by trade a carpenter and mechanic. He is now keeping hotel 
in St. George ; he was in the Union army during the war, 



496 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

and for awhile was stationed at Wheeling and at one time 
was ordered to Stannton, but never reached it. 

S. N. Swisher, son of David Swisher, was born in Hamp- 
shire County in 1848 ; he is of German, French, Swiss and 
English descent ; he gets his Swiss from the S wishers and 
his English fi-om the Bonifields. In 1875 he married Mary 
S., daughter of Jesse Parsons. Children : Minnie B. and 
Scott N. He has taught eleven schools — three in Hamp- 
shire County, two in Mineral and six in Tucker ; he is a 
number one teacher, but has now retired from the profes- 
sion and has turned his whole attention to farming ; he came 
to Tucker in 1873 and bought a farm on Horse Shoe Run, 
five miles from St. George. It contains 80 acres of im- 
proved land and 94 acres of wild land. His farm is in the 
very best condition, and is a model of modern agriculture. 
Besides his Horse Shoe Run farm, he has a half interest in 
the Job Parsons farm, in the Holly Meadows, five miles from 
St. George. It contains 327 acres, with 120 acres improved. 
In 1869 he was a brakeman on the B. & O. R. R. from Pied- 
mont to Grafton ; he followed this work a short time, and 
then went west, visiting the States as far as Iowa, Missouri 
and Kansas. Not being altogether pleased with it, as he 
found it, he returned to West Virginia and bought him a 
farm. He has been on the teachers' board of examiners 
and president of the board of education, 

Augustus J. Stansbury, was born in 1848, and married in 
1864, at the age of 16, to Mary A. Montgomery, of Barbour 
County. Children : Jonah, Henry, Polly Ann, Josiah, Eloy 
and George Nelson. 

Frank A. H. Spesert, of German descent, son of George 
Spesert, of Horse Shoe Run, was born in 1853. He is gen- 



BEIEF BIOGEAPHIES. 407 

erally working on a farm, but occasionally lie follows some 
other business for the sake of change. He is an excellent 
worker and often gets much higher wages than other lalx)v- 
ers. He seems to have been marked out for bad luck. 
When he was a boy he s])lit his ankle bone with an ax and 
was helpless six months. Then, afterward, he had his leg 
broken by a saw-log. Later, another log rolled oyer him 
and mashed his head, cheek and jaw. It broke him of the 
habit of chewing tobacco, for his jaw won't crush it. 

Heney Shrader, born in Germany 1809, died 1878. He 
came to America in 1838 and in 1848 was married in Cum- 
berland to Tracy Headlough, of Germany. The next year 
he came to Lead Mine, a branch of Plorse Shoe Eun, and 
commenced opening up a farm. His land, 139 acres, was 
half under cultivation at the time of his death. His chil- 
dren are : Mary Jane, Henry, Crista, John, Lewis D., Teena 
Margaret,Mar3' Louisa,Tracy Carolina and Sophia Elizabeth. 

WiLLLUi Sh.vfee, born 1857, son of Samuel Shafer, of 
English and German descent, was married, 1882, to Lizzie, 
daughter of John C. Plum. Their child's name is Stranda. 
He is a farmer and lumberman, living three miles below St. 
George. 

Thomas P. Spencer, born 1833, son of Joseph Si^tencer, 
married, 1858, to Catharine Lewis. He farms 30 acres of 
improved land, and has 95 acres of Avild territory, on Loca- 
tion, 7 miles from St. George. Children : Sarah E., John 
Thomas McClellan, Mary L. and James O. He spent three 
years in the L'niou army, and took part in Hunter's raid ; 
was in several battles, and was wounded at Cedar Creek by 
a Minie-ball which passed through his ankle. He was per- 
manently disabled bv the wound and now receives a pension. 

32' 



498 HI8T0KY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

CxEor.GE F. SrESERT, born in Maryland, 1803, of German 
descent, son of David Spesert, was married, 1842, to Clo- 
riuda L, daughter of David Gilmore, of Shafer's Fork. 
Children : David H., Susan C, Mary E., Joseph W., Lettie 
P., Christena Perlinder, Margaret C. S., George William, 
Franklin A. H., Nicholas W. and Taylor. His farm of 82 
acres, half improved, is partly in Tucker and partly in Pres- 
ton, on Horse Shoe Eun, 12 miles from St. George ; has been 
living Avliere he now lives since abaut 1854. 

L. W. Shaffei;, born, 1851, in Preston, son of Abram 
Bhatfer, a German, was married in 1870 to Olive A. Stemple, 
daughter of Major D. Stemple, of Preston. Children: Ar- 
dilla B., Jessie Myrtle, Daisy Dean, Ora Ross, Ethel Lee, 
Odessa. He lives in Canaan, 31 miles from St. George, and 
Las four acres of improved land on a farm of 12 acres ; his 
is the most commodious house in Canaan and probably in 
the county. He is foreman on his brother's land, which 
joins his own. 

Geouge C. Shafeec, born at Horse Shoe Run P. O., Pres- 
ton County, 185(5, son of Jacob Shaffer, of German descent. 
In 18S>) he mairied Mary Belle Domire, of Lead Mine, 
daughter of D. L. Domire. He is by trade a carpenter, and 
has an intcre-it in the "Dimiire Shingle Mill." 

David H. Si'Eseut, son of George Spesert, born, 1841, in 
Haryland, came to Horse Shoe Run in 1854 and twent}'- 
three years later he Avas married to Perezinda Frances, 
daughter of Thomas M. Mason. He lives on Horse Shoe 
Run, 12 miles from St. Creorge, and followed the shoe- 
maker's trade 5 years ; he is noAv a farmer. 

Daniel SrAXGLEi;, son of Jacob Spangler, born 1850, of 
German descent. In 1878 he was married to Marv A., 



BKIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 499 

daughter of Alexander Campbell. Their child's name is. 
WiUiam A. By trade, he is a blacksmith, but of late he 
has turned his attention to farming, and lives on Miller Hill, 
5 miles from St. George. 

John A. Swisher, son of David Swisher, of HamiDshir© 
County, was born 1857 ; is of English and Swiss descent ; 
was married in 1883 to Ella, daughter of E. W. McGill, of 
Hampshire County ; is a farmer of 150 acres, one half under 
cultivation, on Horse Shoe Run, 5 miles from St. George ; 
has also a half interest in the "Job Parsons" farm in Holly 
Meadows. He attended the public schools of Hampshire, 
and one term at Low Gap, in Tucker County, and attended the 
Fairmont Normal School one year — 1878-1879 ; has taught 
five schools, one in Hampshire and four in Tucker. He 
holds four No. 1 certificates in Tucker ; is a brother to S. 
N. Swisher, and like him is a model farmer. His plantation 
is tilled and kept in the best manner. 

David L. Stevens, a native of Pennsylvania, came to 
Tucker with C. R. Macomber, and has since lived here. 
He is of distant German descent. His farm on Wolf Run is 
four miles from St. George. His children are Giles, Susan, 
David and Minta. 

William M. Spesert, of English and German descent, was 
born 1814. He is a son of George Spesert and has lived all 
his life on Horse Slioe Run, except four years in St. George ; 
is a farmer of 400 acres of land ; lives on the farm that for- 
merly belonged to William Losh, on Horse Slioe Run, six 
miles from St. George. In 1874 he was married to Mary 
Maxwell, daughter of Rufus Maxwell; his children are Jen- 
nie Miller, George Frances and AVillis Maxwell. 

T. 

E. W. Thomas, born 1848, married Virginia Nutter, 1867, 



500 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

His wife died and he married Mary E., daughter of Joseph 
Hawkins, of Monongalia County. His farm contains 118 
acres, 4 miles from St. George on Clover. Children : Ida 
Black, Isaac E., Russell E,, and Earnest C. 

AViLLiAM E. Talbott, son of F. D. Talbott, was born Feb- 
ruary 24, 1843, at the old Talbott farm, four miles below St. 
George. The Talbott family originally came from Mary- 
land, and seem to be of English descent, slightly mixed with 
German. In 1865 he married Analiza Kalar,of Clover Run. 
His children are : Howard, Charles, Francis, and George B. 
The history of W. E. Talbott is one that is of interest to all 
who would know of the war, and how Tucker County's boys 
fared in it. He remained on his father's farm, hard at work, 
all his life until he was seventeen years old. The old farm 
is now about as it was then. The war and the lapse of 
twenty-five or thirty years, have made little change in it, 
and four miles below St. George it may be still seen about 
as it was when young Talbott worked there, hoeing the corn, 
hilling the potatoes and repairing broken fences that storms 
had dilapidated or rampageous cattle had overthrown in 
their rage for green corn or young clover. To this work the 
farmer boy, whose youthful days are fated to be spent in 
Tucker, must get accustomed ; for, such it must be. When 
the snows of winter depart from the fields, and under the 
influence of sjd ring's first warm days the grass begins to get 
green, the hungry cattle that have chewed dry fodder for 
their lives during the snowy months, begin to roam up and 
down the plantations to find out the weak places in the en- 
closures, and to burst through them or to leap over, to fat- 
ten on the tender vegetation which is peeping through the 
husky straws of last year, still lying like corpses upon the 
ground, among the brier bunches, and against the banks and 



BBIEF BIOGKAPHIES. 601 

small hills that front toward the southern warmness. 

It may have been from his observations that those fields 
that faced the south were the most sunny in springtime, 
when sunshine was genial and beautiful, that, from his 
earliest years he developed an admiration and sympathy for 
the land of the South, and regarded it as bourn of all that 
was noble and patriotic. Be this as it may, he admired the 
South, and in the arguments that came up when the county 
was dissevering into two parts, he never let an opportunity 
to speak and uphold his choice pass unused. The wise 
heads whose mental force shape, it may be, the course, if 
not the destiny, of nations, saw not sooner than the country 
boys where the storm of war would break. The elements 
of tumult were mingled in affinity all through the human 
composition of the United States, although more in some 
parts than in others, and statesmen could see no further 
with all their models of past empires and past destinies 
than the farmer lads knew by intuition, or by natural knowl- 
edge. The clash would be a war, and as such it would end 
as chance ends its works. The boys saw this, and took part 
as their fancy, principles or passions directed. 

Such a boy was William E. Talbott ; and such boys were 
his neighbors, Cornelius and Nelson Parsons, Dock Long 
and Pi-obert See, who now sleeps in his rock- walled grave 
near the dreary shore of Owen's Lake, in the desert 
domains of the Sierra Nevadas, in California. When the 
-war — which came slowly as a fire on a fuse, and flashed into 
myriads of simultaneous explosions, as magazines of warlike 
munitions ignited — had really come, Tucker County's young 
men caught up such arms as they had and started South — • 
nearly all went South. Cornelius and Nelson Parsons and 
Bobert See went in May, 18G1, but Talbott did not go till 



502 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

June. He joined Garnett's army at Huttonsville, in Ran- 
dolph Count}^ just in time to take part in the battles and 
share in the defeats, routs and starvations. The boys found 
it a rough beginning to the life of glory which they had pic- 
tured themselves about to enter. 

The history of the battles at Laurel Hill, Rich Mountain 
and Corrick's Ford, and the consequent retreat that resulted 
so disastrously to Garnett's army, has been detailed to some 
length in another chapter, and it is needless to repeat it. 
Talbott was in it all and endured it all. He found it harsh 
usage to a boy of his years to be taken from the easy work 
of a farm and placed in a crowded road of retreating sol- 
diers, and made to march to the music of their trundling 
cannon, while the July rains pelted him and the July suns 
scorched him, and Yankee scouts tormented him from the 
rear, and rumors of Yankee cannon came in from the front 
with grim dimensions. But the farmer boy of 18 years was 
into it now, and he had to go through with the last ordeal 
that lay in the way of that retreating army which fled from 
Corrick's Ford July 14, 1861. AVith shoeless feet he hob- 
bled over the stony road, and waded the sticky mud, and got 
no breakfast and fared the same at noon, and marched all 
night without his supper. About this time he was thinking 
of the old farm four miles below St. George, where in the 
early summer the strawberries look red in the fields, and the 
dewberries grow wild along the river. But it was a dream 
not to be realized for him to think of it then. He Avas 
mixed in one of the most shameful routs of the war, and he 
must go through with it. 

At the Red House, at 2 o'clock in the morning of July 
15th, he got a Httl^ rest, and got a few mouthfuls of beef, 
the first food ho had tasted for two days. This halt was 



BEIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 503 

while Captain Harper and company were going to the 
top of Backbone Mountain to see if the enemy were there. 
The rest came good to the wretched Rebels, who were tired 
and starved nearly to death. The next day they reached 
Petersburg, in Grant County. The citizens brought in 
plenty of provisions, and the army rested two days, and 
then proceeded to Monterey, in Highland County, Ya. 
From there it went into Greenbrier County. 

The general lighting soon began. On October 3rd, Tal- 
bott was one of 1 20 Avho held in check for an hour and 
twenty minutes, Milroy's 5000 men. When the Confederate 
pickets could hold the Feelerals in check no longer, they fell 
back upon the Rebel c amp and the Yankees followed within 
a short distance but did not attempt to cross the river. 
There was some cannonading. The Rebels were commanded 
by Col. Edward Johnson. In the September previous the 
Rebels had made an attack on the Yankees at Cheat Mount- 
ain, and got thrashed. In November they, the Rebels, went 
into winter quarters on the top of the Alleghany Mountains. 
The Yankees now thought it their time to attack the Rebels, 
which they did on December 13. The attack was made be- 
fore daylight in the morning and lasted until 2 p. m. The 
result was that the Yankees got worse whipped than the 
Rebels had been at Cheat Mountain in September. This 
was a hard wdnter and the Rebels suffered ver}- much. The 
snow fell deep, and they had only the merest shelter 
and some had none. Talbott often slept out in the snow, 
with only a blanket around him. No doubt the return of 
the spring Avas to them a welcome visitor. AVhether the old 
strawberry fields came into Talbott's mind, it is hard now to 
say, but probably they did. But he had few sj^are moments 
to think of or remember such things, for the Avar wiis come 



504 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

with more fury than ever, and the Rebels soon found it to 
their advantage to fall back within six inDes of Staunton. 
About the last of May or first of June they attacked the 
Federals at McDowell. 

Now came on a series of battles. It was at this time that 
Captain Harper rode to the Rebel headquarters and 
notified them that the Federals Avere moving upon Jackson's 
rear. Battles took place in rapid succession. Stonewall 
Jackson SAvept everything before him. Talbott was taken 
sick and was sent to the hospital. While there a band of 
Y^ankees broke in and captured him, and carried him off. 
He received good treatment, and soon after Avas paroled, 
with others Avho were taken at the same time. The com- 
pany to Avhich Talbott belonged was Company I, made up 
in LeAvis County, under Alfred Jackson, a coiisin to 
Stone Avail. 

After he Avas paroled, Talbott never got back to the 
army. "When the Avar was over, he married and settled 
doAvn to the life of a useful and industrious citizen. He is a 
tiuiner by trade, and in connection Avith his tannery, he 
runs a saddlery and harness slio]). He also opened a 
hotel in St. George soon after he Avas married^ but closed it 
again. In 1880 he reopened it and has since kept it open 
to the public. He has held several offices, and Avas nom- 
inated in 1880 by the Democratic convention for sheriff of 
Tucker County. The old farm Avhere he spent his boyhood 
days is as famous a straAvberry jilantation as ever, and the 
earh' sunsliin«^ of spring calls forth the grass as early as 
ever, and tlie rampageous cattle break the fences as bad 
as ever. 

FiNLEV Toy, born, 1854, in Armstrong County, Pennsyl- 
vania, son of James Toa", of Irish, English and German de- 



BRIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 505 

scent. He has been in the lumbering business ever since 
he could carry stove wood. He is partner in the firm of 
Minear & Toy. He is a pushing business man, and has 
friends wherever he goes. Mr. Toy married J. Almyra, 
daughter of Capt. William Elliott, of Kingwood, Preston 
County, on Tuesday, October 7, 1884, 

V. 

Isaac N. Vanscoy, son of John Vanscoy, of Barbour, bom 
1854, married, 1879, to Margaret A., daughter of John 
Bright, and lives 14 miles above St. George. Children: 
Laura Dill and Bertha Ellen. 

Henky L. Vanmetee, born, 1848, in Barbour County, son 
of Benjamin F. Vanmeter, of German and English descent ; 
married, 1872, to Mary E., daughter of William Weaver, of 
Barbour County ; is a farmer, living 7 miles above St. George, 
with 24 acres of improved land and 42 acres of wild land. 
Children : Alice Only, S. J. Tilden, Benjamin F., and Wes- 
ley B. He came to Tucker in 1882. 

Joshua Vanscoy, born, 1827, in Randolph County, son of 
Aaron Vanscoy, of German descent ; married in Randolph 
to Margaret Hayes, 1848. Children : Susan Columbia and 
Rebecca Jane. In 1875 his wife died, and two years later 
he married Lavina C. Wilson ; is a farmer of 86 acres, with 
40 acres improved, 15 miles from St. George. 

Jonathan Vaknee was born in 1831 in Pendleton County, 
of German descent. In 1850 he married Margaret Whis- 
tleman ; she died in 1861, and he married Mary Puffin- 
barger. Children : Elizabeth J., John, Henry H., William, 
James, Madison, Emiline, Martin, Teena, Hawley and 
Sarah Ann.; is a farmer and miller, living on Red Creek, 27 
miles from St. George. 



506 HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

w. 

George K. Wilt, son of Peter Wilt, born in 1848. In 
1870 he married Lncinda J., daughter of Elijah Phillips ; is 
a farmer, living 10 miles from St. George, on Brushy Fork, 
where he owns 102 acres, with 40 improved. Children : 
Andrew, Ida, Elizabeth C, Almarine, Nora and Eilot. 

Thomas Wilt, born in 1856, married in 1875, to Osee A., 
ilaughter of Daniel Nester ; lives on rented land 1^ miles 
from St. George, on Clover. Children : Clarinda C, Colum- 
bus, Fanny F. and Jeeca. 

Wilson Wilt, brother to Thomas and son of Peter Wilt, 
was born in 1848, and married in 1869 to Elizabeth Kiser. 
Children : Louisa C, Cora, Sarah A. and William H.; has a 
farm of 90 acres, with 40 acres improved, 10 miles from St. 
George, on Brushy Fork. 

BuNYON J. WoLFORD, SOU of Jacob Wolford, was born in 
1844. In 1870 he married Sarah E., daughter of E. P. 
Johnson ; lives on Dry Fork 25 miles from St. George and 
owns 400 acres of land, 8 per cent, of which is under tiUage. 
Children: Richard S., Sampson D., Mary Jane, James 
Daniel and Ingiaby Etta. 

Jacob C. Wolford, deputy sheriff of Tucker County, was 
born in 1830, and is a son of John Wolford, of Hampshire 
County, where he was born in 1802. He was a German ; 
came to Red Creek early in the present century, and was 
one of the first settlers of that region. Jacob Wolford is a 
man of good business qualifications. Married Phoebe 
Bright, of Randolph County; has three children living: 
Columbus J., Phoebe C. and Ursula. He had four children 
to die of diphtheria in 1863. He is a farmer, and has been 
constable, overseer of the poor and deputy sheriff, under 
A. C. Minear. 



BKIEF BIOGKAPHIES. 507 

A. I. Wilson was born in 1859 in Garrett County, Md., 
of German descent, and son of J. H. Wilson. He is doing 
business for the firm of Feely & Wilson, at Fairfax. 

Aakon Wolford, son of John Wolford, was born 1856. 
In 1875 he married Elizabeth, daughter of Robert Flanagan. 
He owns 25 acres, and has 60 per cent, of it under cultiva- 
tion, 24 miles from St. George on Dry Fork. Children : 
James W., Phoebe J., Minnie Ann, Lottie Ellen, Fanny and 
Mollie. 

Abraham Wolford, brother to the above, was born in 
1845 ; married, 1873, to Jennie Day ; lives 24 miles from St. 
George, on Red Creek. Children : Cora E., John and Sal- 
lie ; is a laborer. 

Columbus Wolford, son of John Wolford, was born in 
1834. In 1855 he married Mary, daughter of William Flan- 
agan. Children : Christina, Edna, Malan, Columbia E., 
Claudius, Amelius, Mary, Alice and Florence J.; owned 250 
acres of land on Red Creek, 30 miles from St. George, and 
had 100 acres improved. He died in 1878. 

Malan Wolford, son of Columbus Wolford, lives 30 miles 
from St. George, on Red Creek ; was born in 1862, and is a 
farmer. 

John T. Wolford, son of John Wolford, was born in 
1840 ; married Narissa, daughter of Gabriel Rains, in 1859. 
His wife died in 1862, and he married Susanna, daughter of 
Ebenezer Flanagan. He lives in Canaan. Children : Fran- 
ces, J. B. Floyd, Hannah, Anderson, Narissa and Susanna. 

Jacob J. White, son of Allen White, of Grant County, 
was born in 1852; married Sarah C, daughter of Elizabeth 
Thompson, in 1876. He is a farmer and lives on Red 



508 HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

Creek, 30 miles from St. George. He owns 130 acres and 
Las only 5 acres under tillage; lias been in Tucker 
since 1877. Children : Ida, Henry C. and Owen L. 

Joseph White, born, 1844, in Grant County, son of Allen 
White, of Irish and English descent. In 1866 he manied 
Susan Willfong, a widow, daughter of Enos Helmick. 
Children: Abel, Amos, Elizabeth, Allen, Harness, Mary 
Jane, Frank, Martin K., James B. and Fannie. His farm of 
130 acres, is on Red Creek, 30 miles from St. George ; has 
ten acres improved ; served nearly four years in the Confed- 
erate army, part of the time under Imboden ; was in several 
battles about and above Winchester, and in the battle of 
Gettysburg ; came home on a furlough, four months before 
the close of the war, and did not go back. 

Thomas D. Wilson, of German extraction, born, 1820 ; 
married, 1849, to Margaret Nester. Children: Andrew F., 
Henry M., Harriett and Elizabeth. Farmer, 263 acres, 9 
acres improved ; 6 miles from St. George, west. 

Thomas Williams, born in Pennsylvania, 1819, of Welsh 
descent ; never married ; has been in the mercantile business, 
farming and stock-raising ; came to Tucker in 1879 for his 
health and was so pleased with the country that he remained. 
He has traveled considerably, and now lives on Horse Shoe 
Run, 10 miles from St. George. 

William T. White, son of John White, of Garrett 
County, Md., was born 1825, and married in 1848 to Mary 
Ann, daughter of John James. He is a farmer of 100 acres 
with 60 acres improved, on Limestone, 7 miles from St. 
George. He has been overseer of the poor, member of the 
board of education and justice of the peace. Children: 
Jolin P., Thomas E., William P., Martha E. and Columbia. 



BRIEF BIOGRAPHIES. 509 

John T. White, son of William T. White, was born 1849; 
married 1868, to Eliza J., daughter of Thomas M. Mason. 
He is a farmer of 90 acres, with 70 acres improved, on Mill 
Run, 10 miles from St. George. He was constable four 
years. Children : Virginia F., Arthur' M., Elizabeth Anna, 
Earl M., Maud L. and Clyde. 

Thomas E. White, son of William T. White, was born in 
1853; married 1878 to Susan, daughter of Thomas M. Mason. 
He is a farmer of 100 acres of land, with 30 acres improved, 
on Mill Run, 10 miles from St. George, Children : Florena 
M., Maggie L., Edgar M. and Anna J. 

Thomas W. Wilmoth, son of James M. Wilmoth, of Ran- 
dolph County, was born in 1849. In 1875 he married 
Clorinda C, daughter of John I. Propst. Children : Oscar 
J. and Leon J. He has a farm of 40 acres nearly all im- 
proved, on Haddix Run, 10 miles from St. George. 

Samuel B. Wamsley was born in 1840, son of A. M. 
Wamsley, of Scotch and Irish descent, was married in 1869 
to Martha Crouch, of Randolph. His wife died in 1875 and 
the next year he was married to Elizabeth W., daughter of 
Ward Parsons. Children: Berdie, Cletus Branch, Stark 
and Ward. His farm in the Horse Shoe, two miles from 
town, of 353 acres, has 140 acres improved. 

Peter Wilt was born in 1819, in Maryland, of German 
descent. In 1839 he married Catharine Wilson. He lives 
on Clover two miles from St. George, and follows farming 
and saloon keeping, the only saloon in Tucker County. 
Children : John H., Mary M., Abogail, George K., Sarah J., 
Vilena, Thomas, Anzina and Wilson. 

Jacob B. WoTRixa,^'" born, 1834, son of Peter Wotring, 
was married in 1863 to Ellen, daughter of Robert K. Knotts, 

' Tliis name Is often written " Wooclrlng." 



510 HISTORY OF TUCKEE COUNTY. 

of Gloss Mountain. Children: Hemy J., Stella A., Fanny, 
Jeckoliah and George Edgar. He is a farmer of 134 acres, 
half cultivated, and has one hundred bearing apple trees, 
and forty peach trees. He came to Tucker from Preston, 
1844, and settled near where Alexander Closs now lives. 
The next year he moved to his own farm about 12 miles 
from St. George on Horse Shoe Run. In one winter he 
killed 7 panthers. 

W. M. West, born, 1842, in Baltimore, Maryland, is not a 
resident of Tucker further than that in the capacity of a 
minister of the M. E. Church ; he traveled in the county in 
1884. He was married in 1874 to Emily M. Naylor, of 
Maryland. Children : Florence Y., Edward E., William N. 
and baby. 

Dennis I^oakum, of German descent, from Grant County, 
son of Alfred Yoakum, born, 1852 ; married, 1884. Farmer, 
28 miles from St. George on Dry Fork ; been in Tucker since 
1882 ; owns 100 acres of land, 20 acres improved. Children : 
Sarah Ann and Adam. 

John W. 1'ageii, born, 1847, in Preston, German and Irish 
descent; married, 1867, to Laverna Ganer, of Barbour 
County. Children: Truman L., Coretta G., Emory J., 
Leaper A., Fernando C, Dorphretta A. and Effie C. He is 
a farmer of 160 acres, 45 acres improved, on Haddix Run, 
fourteen miles fro^ St. George. He is a preacher of the M. 
E. Church South. 

GEorvGE W. I'oKUM, born, 1847, in Missouri ; married, 1876, 
to Elizabeth, daughter of William J. Flanagan. His farm on 
Red Creek, 30 miles from St. George, contains 153 acres, 
half improved. He belonged to the Home Guards. Chil- 
dren : Clctis, Stella and Ferva. 



APPENDIX 



BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF THl\ AUTllon:" 

Hu MAX^YELL was born in Tucker County, Western Yir- 
ginia, September 22, 1860, of educated and respectable par- 
entage, — of Englisli, German and Irish descent. He is a 
son of tlie Hon. Rufus Maxwell, of St. George, one of tlie 
well-known and influential citizens of Virginia. 

In looking for facts concerning the early life of young 
Maxwell, we find in him but few traits not noticeable in the 
average intelligent representative of Young America. 

He was reared on a farm. As a general rule, farmers' 
boys have to work, and especially has this always been the 
case in Tucker County. But young Maxwell was not partial 
to manuel labor, and many were the deep schemes he laid to 
avoid it. One of his favorite plans to escape work— then an 
absolute torture to him — was, to get very sick and go with- 
out dinner, and then after the others of the family had gone 
to their work, for him to pillage the pantry, and then stroll 
ofi' to build toy mills and construct mud mill-races. After 
having tired himself at such work he w^ould lie down and go 



• TMs sketch of Hu Maxwell was written by Henry Clay Hyde, Esq., a prominent 
lawyer ol the Kingwood Bar, and a man of rare literary merits. He and Maxwell are 
exactly the same height and weight, and nearly the same age, and possess tempera- 
ments nearly the same. Both are fond of travel and romance ; and their travels have 
been over nearly the same grounds. :Mr. Hyde, from his intimate acquaintance with 
the subject of the sketch is well qualified for the undertaking which he has accom- 
plished. He has dealt Impartially, as may be seen from his criticisms where there is 
aught to criticise. He has had access to papers and memoranda of Maxwell which 
few persons have had the privilege of seeing, and from them he has drawn where it 
was necessary to do so.— J as. W. White. 



512 HISTOEY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

to sleep. No matter how often, or liow loud, his parents 
•would call for him, he would not answer them. If he was 
asleep he had not heard them ; but if he was awake, and 
Avithin hearing, he was too busy to answer calls which did 
not, in the least, concern him. More than once did his 
parents have the whole neighborhood hunting for him — 
calling and searching everj^where — and, when discovered, 
would be found watching, serenely and quietly, the move- 
ments of his anxious parents and friends, from some obscure 
spot in the Avood-yard or through a crack in the paling fence 
surrounding the garden. 

He differed from other boj^s in this : he had no associates 
or playmates. Not a boy on Horse Shoe Run associated 
wdth him. It appears that he preferred to " associate with 
himself" and roam through the forests and by the brook- 
side, and commune with nature in the way which w^e then 
appreciated her inspiring beauties, than to be in the lively 
and frolicsome company of all the boys in the neighborhood. 
His natural disposition appeared to be that of a consum- 
mate recluse, and as such, at the early age of eight years 
we find him in his seclusion courting the muses. He began 
by extemporizing poetry — usually doggrel of four lines, 
describing anything that would attract his attention or 
strike his fancy. But he did not write them down, for he 
had reached his fourteenth year before he could wi'ite. He 
generally forgot them as soon as he saw anything else which 
suggested a subject upon which to exercise his poetical ge- 
nius. However, he had remembered a few when he learned 
to write, and wrote them down, keeping them until 1880, 
when, upon being appointed a cadet to the U. S. Naval 
Academy, he burned all his poetry with the exception of a 
few compositions. 





Hu Maxwell. 



C. H. Maxwell. 




Abe Bonnipield 




APPENDIX. r,13 

One of the four-line cloggrels composed by liini -when 
quite a small l)oy, it is not remembered at what age, was 
preseved by him after learning how to write. The idea was 
suggested by seeing some hogs rooting in a swamp. The 
lines show a boy's ability to coin words if they possess no 
other merit. The lines ran thus : 

All the liogs are diyginy ileei)er 

After lizzards in the imul; 
And their ears look like a rrrpci\ 

And their noses like a bud. 

Immediately under this preserved effusion tlie author 
afterwards wrote, " what this means, I don't know ;" and, in 
all probability, he is eorrect. But he must be given credit 
for the possession of a virtue — in other words, a good 
judgment — not usually possessed by those who engage in 
versification at an early age: Although expressing his 
thoughts in rhyme at the early age of eight years, — six 
years before he was taught to Avrite — he was not known to 
oiier a single production to the public until he was twenty 
years of age, at which time his occasional poems elicited 
the very favorable criticism of the leading members of the 
State press. 

His education in the countr}' schools was limited to a few 
months, during which time it was not observed b}' his 
parents that he had made ordinary progress in the attain- 
ment of knowledge. His mother taught him about all he 
knew until he reached his fifteenth year. Up to this time 
he did not learn much ; for he did not know his letters at 
eleven, and never got higher than the Third Reader and the 
rudiments of arithmetic during the time he attended the 
country schools. However — strange to say— at the age of 
fourteen he was one of the ver^^ best geographers in "West 



514 HISTORY OF TUCKEK CX)UNTY. 

Virginia — having taken a fancy to the study — which wa.s 
owing to the fact, no doubt, that he had been langhed at for 
saying that Spain was in the United States, confounding it 
with Maine, This aroused his ambition — likely the first he 
ever experienced. He got Mitchell's geography and atlas 
and went to work to learn the answer to every question in 
it. Every spare moment was devoted to the old geography ; 
and as he never made up his mind to do anything ho did 
not do, in one month he could answer every question, nor 
was his knowledge of the superficial kind. It was ]nactical. 
Now, he and his brother Cyrus put what money the}' had 
together, and bought a ncAver and larger geography and 
■were not long in mastering it. He has never studied geog- 
raphy more than a week since, and has always passed nearly 
perfect examinations in it. 

He had completed geography and was looking about for 
something else when he hit upon history. He got Ander- 
son's General History and went to work on it. Events, 
places and dates seemed to fix themselves naturally in his 
mind, and he soon knew Anderson's History almost as well 
as well as Mitchell's Geography. Meanwhile his oldest 
brother, Wilson C, was attending college. When he camo 
home he Avas surprised to find that Hu was able to teach 
him far more than he ever learned of geograpln* and history. 
Hu continued his reading — almost constantly, and read 
scores of histories, ancient and modern ; and to perfect his 
knowledge in ancient history, took a course in ancient 
geography. 

When he had completed history he looked for another 
book ; for it always was, and now is, his nature and charac- 
teristic, not to attempt to do two things at the same time. 
Eo alwavs finishes one thinu- before becrinuincr anotluT. 



APPENDIX. 515 

While looking for a new book, lie found a Davies' Algebra 
and Adams' Latin Grammar — books which his mother had 
learned from. He was examining the algebra and grammar, 
when he was told that he would save time by the study of 
arithmetic, before that of algebra ; also, by learning some- 
thing of English grammar before beginning the study of 
Latin. He at once got a grammar (Kirkham's) and went 
through it. He then went through Pinneo, Smith and Har- 
vey. He learned the definitions, but did not understand 
the science. However, he was of the opinion that he did, 
and knew no better until J. J. Peterson, Esq., gave him his 
first insight into tlie science some three years latei-. 

All this took place while he was under sixteen years of 
age, and was at home trudging on the farm or at m ork on the 
saw-mill. 

His knowledge of geography and history begat in him a 
desire for travel. When .the Centennial Exhibition came, 
he was nearly sixteen, and wanted to go. His father took 
him and his three next younger brothers. As it has been 
expressed : " It Avas his first sight of terrestrial creation in 
all its magnificence." 

When he returned from Philadelphia — in October — ho 
was sent to Weston, AV. Ya., to scliool.'-'' His experieiu-e 
there was about about what ever}' other l)oy"s is at school, 
except that he would confine himself to but one branch of 
study at a time. He recited in several branches ; but arith- 
metic got all the study. He got through Piaj-'s Third Arith- 
metic and was turned back to go through it again ; for somo 
of the boys were hiz}' and others had to hang back on their 

* Tlie first year Mr. Maxwell attenfled the Weston Academj", the school was taught 
Yjy Louis Bennett, now Prosecutingr Attorney of Lewis County ; the second year it 
was tauglit by J. J. Petei"Son, now eiiitor of the IIuntln<,'ton IJcpuiJlican ; and iu i,S7S- 
TU it was under tlie rnana'4f' nn-ut of L. C. C'ripiion. 



I 



oir, HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

account. While lie was going through arithmetic a second 
time, he Avas making philosophy his special study. 

When school was out in the spring of 1877, he went home 
and worked on the farm that summer. He now took up the 
study of algebra. 

In the fall he again returned to Weston 'and pursued his 
studies. The text-books, from which he recited in the class- 
room, did not interest him, and he spent the greater part of 
his time reading works on geology and astronomy. He was 
now in Higher Arithmetic. 

When the term ended, he did not go home, but remained 
with his grandfather, and worked a little on the farm. 
Here he took up his Higher Arithmetic, and in three weeks 
had worked every example in it, with but a single exception. 
After the completion of the arithmetic he imdertook the 
study of Latin, and he met a warrior — though dead — not 
easy to conquor. He thought he could learn the language 
that summer, but he was mistaken. 

In 1878-79 his progress was as i-apid as usual and his 
work no less incessant. Still clinging to the ]iractice of 
pursuing but one study to the exclusion of all others, he 
took a fancy to Geometry, and went through the works of 
several authors on the subject. 

About tliis time the students of the Academy organized a 
debating society. They had a debate every Friday evening. 
Capital punishment 'was debated with great warmth and 
enthusiasm, and the people of the town shared in the ex- 
citement. Mr. Maxwell was against capital punishment, 
and so deeply did he rivet his convictions, that to-day he is 
uncompromisingly o])i)osed to the death penalty. His 
studies Avero likely neglecte'd in order that he might throw 
.•tlbhis eiieruios into the debates in wliich lie engaged. The 



AXPENDIX. 517 

writer has heard him saj : " My studying, then, was more 
of a desultory character than most people thought." He 
was al\va3's studying something, but it was one thing at a 
time, to the exclusion or neglect of everything else. 

He fell into the habit of reading biography, and usually 
read fort}'- pages a day. He went through the whole curric- 
ulum of English authors from Chaucer to Tennyson, and 
did likewise with the history of the nAval and military men 
of the world. He read everything of a biographical nature 
that he could get possession of. He then returned to his- 
tories and read everything from Josephus to Peter Parley. 
He could read an average-sized book in a day, and so re- 
markable Avas his memory that he could remember every 
event, place and date in it. While he was doing this, of 
course, other studies were more or less neglected. 

In June, 1880, Mr. Maxwell graduated. He was given a 
diploma on twenty-one branches, six of which he had never 
studied in school three days in his life. Bvit he passed his 
examination on them, and passed well. He had gained his 
information from general reading. On the day before he 
was to be examined on bookkeeping, he borrowed Duff's 
treatise on that subject, and read it that night. The next 
day he answered every question asked him and was given 
100 per cent, on the examination. He never opened a work 
on geolog}- in the school room and yet never missed a ques- 
tion. He had read probably a dozen books on the siibject 
— also on mineralogy and astronomy — so ho had no need of 
studying them in the school room. 

Full one-half of the school-time study of his life was de- 
voted to Latin. He studied Greek for a short time but 
never made much progress. However, he studied it long 
enough to be al)le to read a few sentences in Herodotus, 



r>18 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

Xenophon and Homer, Avlieii ho (juit it — forever. He had 
not made up his mind to learn it. But in Latin it was dif- 
ferent. He studied hard, and has often been known to take 
the grammar and steal away from others and then, for 
liours, dig like a Trojan to learn the conjugations. He was 
afflicted with headache almost constantly, for two years, 
which was, no doubt, caused by constant study. 

In school and out", Mr. Maxwell has read a pretty full 
course in tlie Latin classics. Tirgil, Livy and Cfesar are his 
favorites. He can repeat several books of Virgil, nearly 
entire, in the original language, and has M-ritten a transla- 
tion of several chapters of C*sar. 

In English he has read nearly all the standard poets, 
Shakspeare, Byron, Pope and Tennyson in particular. 
Byron is his choice, clearl}^ above all writers, ancient or 
modern, and he has committed to memory nearly half his 
poems. 

As a student, Mr. Maxwell has always been a too-close 
one. His study at school was intense, but done in an in-eg- 
ular manner. Everything Avas carried to extremes. During 
the four years he spent at tlie Weston Academy, it is be- 
lieved that he read four times as much as any other student 
there, and was alwayp. ]>erfect in his recitations. It may 
not be out of place to add here that he never read but one 
novel'in his life. 

In May, 1880, he wiis a})pointed a Cadet Engineer to the 
Taiited States Naval Academy, at Annapolis, Md.; but did 
not go to Annapolis until the following September. The 
summer of 1880 Avas a momentous one to him. He did 
raor(i intense, devoted studying that summer than during 
any otlier two y(>ars of his life, studying almost night and 
day. Often n week would pass Avithout taking more than 



APrENDIX. 519 

tn-elve hours sleej). Freciueiitl}", he woiihl not rest his head 
ou a pillow or disrobe himself for sleep twice in two weeks. 
He would study uutil after midnight, throw himself on the 
floor, or rest his head on his stand, and sleep an hour or 
two, wake up excited and luirry to his books again. He 
was preparing for the Annapolis examinations ; and, judg- 
ing from what we know of him, he was determined that the 
result of his study should be success or death. The little 
sleep he got was no rest from study. His mind v/as as 
hard at work while his body was asleep as when awake. 
-AJgebra, geometry and philosophy were the subjects of his 
dreams. How he endured it we cannot tell. But he broke 
down at last. When the time came to go to Annapolis, he 
was sick and nearly blind. However, he went and passed 
the examination without trouV)le. He called up all his re- 
serve strength and worked to remain in the Academy. From 
day to day he got worse and his eyesight failed. He knew 
more than enough to have remained, but his health was 
broken down — he was blind and nervous. He saw — in fact 
he was told so — that it would be impossible for him to re- 
main, so he packed up his valise, took a steamer, and went 
off on tlie Chesapeake Bay, and has not seen Annapolis 
since. 

Had Mr. Maxwell been more moderate in stud}', he might 
have remained at the Academy ; but his tendency to carry 
study to an extreme, caused the failure of his health. He 
is now glad that he coidd not remain. He believes that he 
would have deserted anyhow within two years. His desire 
to go to Colorado at that time would, no doubt, have led 
liirn to arrive at such a conclusion. 

All along, up to this time, he had written a erses on almost 
everv imaginable subject. Some of tlir ])oems were of 



^20 HISTOPvY OF TUCaCEll COUNTY. 

cousiderfiblo length. On oue he Avoiked at odd times and 
on Sundays for eight months, and averaged 1,000 lines a 
month, or 8,000 in all. It was a metrical, blood-curdling 
romance, written in the measure of HiaAvatha. The scene 
was laid in Madagascar, and to some extent in the adjacent 
countries, and on the Indian Ocean. It contained one tre- 
mendous shipwreck, and there was no end to the fights with 
savages, wild beasts a)id "chimeras dire." There was very 
little original in the story. He had gleaned the incidents 
and episodes from Eastern stories, and from "Drury's Ad- 
ventures in Madagascar." But he found occasion for a few 
fancy touches, in addition, and had two or three exciting 
thunder-storms in the mountains. The manuscript escaped 
the flames of S('ptember 12, 1880, Avhen ]i(i collected and 
burnt 10,000 lines of verse, clearing \\]) liis past record in 
order to begin anew when he shovild enter the Naval 
Academy-. Another poem that escaped his wantonness was 
an allegorical pasquinade, representing a newspaper war 
between two (ulitors, oue of Weston and the other of Buck- 
liannou. This poem contains 1,{M)!) verses. A few shorter 
]«3ems Avere also spared. 

When Mr. Maxwell arrived at home from Annapolis he 
Avas nearly blind. He read biit little during the following 
year. He knew that the best thing for him to do Avas to 
.spend the Avinter as roughly as possibh'. He Avent into the 
lumber business. He chopped logs tind })eeled trees and 
did anything else that came along to bi^ done. He Avorked 
in sunshines snoAV and rain, nor missed a day. He carried 
his dinner to the Avoods Avith liim, and in cold Aveather, 
Avlien mercury stood at xero, his bread and bacon would 
freeze and grit beneath liis teeth ; but it suited him. It 
Avas romance and it was doinu' liim yood. He grew stronger 



APPENDIX. 521 

every day and was soon able to stand almost anything. He 
did not bother his head with books. He might have made 
more money at easier w'ork ; bnt he was rebuilding his con- 
stitution, and well did he succeed. No matter how cold 
the morning, if Horse Shoe Eun was not frozen over, he 
would pull off his boots and wade it. Once when it was 
over its banks — and it is a dangerous stream — he pulled off 
his boots, coat and hat and swam it. The ice was running 
thick, and in tiie drift he was carried down the stream 
nearly a quarter of a ]nile. But he canie out and walked 
home, a half mile, barefooted, through the snow and ice. 

Thus he spent the winter, and the spring found him with 
a constitution like iron. He could say then, as he can say 
now, that, he can stand anything in the shape of ex- 
posure, fatigue or hardship, that any other man can stand. 
About the only literary work of that winter was the writing 
of tAvo novels, "Rich Mountain" and "Llewellyn." 

In the spring of 1881, Mr. Maxwell taught a graded school 
at St. George. He did good work there, 1)ut the school was 
not a financial success. When his school was out he went 
to Parkersburg and took part in an Institute which was in 
progress there at that time. After visiting Blannerhassett 
Island, and other points near Parkersburg, he went to Tay- 
lor County and engaged a school which he taught the fol- 
lowing winter. 

The next summer he spent at home Avriting a history 
called " Conquest of the Ohio Valley." He had worked 
on it some before that time; and in the summer of 1881 he 
had Avritten a history of Tucker County ; but it was not 
published until 1884. The "Conquest" is yet incomplete 
and unpublished. He has worked on it for two years, and 



522 HISTORY OF TUCKER C"OIJ^TY. 

the preparatory reiiding uiul coii)))ilin'jj of iiotfs txtoidod 
back over several years. 

In the fall of 1882 he was invited to deliver an address 
at the Fort Henr3' Centennial, to be celebrated at Wheeling. 
He went and spoke. The address entire was published in 
the ^Mieellnfj Sunday liegister. It was characterized by the 
State press as an eloquent and masterly effort. 

In November of that year be Avent to Cincinnati in the 
interest of his " Conquest." In returning he came up the 
Ohio on the steamer Andes to Huntington, and thence 
home, passing over to the Kanawha, up it and New River 
and the Greenbrier to LeAvisburg. Part of this distance he 
went on the cars and Avalked part. From Lewisburg he 
came across the country, home, a distance of 150 miles. He 
slept by the roadside at night and had a general rough and 
tumble time. For food he ate crackers exclusively. At 
one time he walked eighty miles Avithout stopping any 
place to rest over night. He Avould Avalk until he could go 
no longer, then lie doAvn and sleep a fcAv hours, and then 
up and on again. Thus he Avalked over 200 miles, aver- 
aging thirty-five or fortj^ miles a day. He came from the 
Oreenbrier River to Mingo Flats Avithout stopping an hour 
to rest or sleep. Late at night, above Huttonsville, Ran- 
dolph County, he lay doAvn on tlie ground to sleej). It 
rained and he slept on until nearly day, Avhen he aAV<-)ke 
and proceeded on his Avay. Soon his ankle began to ]>ain 
him, and Avhen he had gotten Avithiu two miles of Beverly, 
it gaA^e away. He could not lift his foot from the ground, 
and was in a sad plight. But he hit upon a plan that suc- 
ceeded. He took a strap that was around his knapsack and 
tied it to his foot, and at every step he Avould lift his foot 
from the ground, and thus went liob1:>ling into Beverly, 



APPENDIX. 523 

where he remained until his ankle got better when he 
proceeded home. 

He spent the winter of 1882-83 at liome in the lumber 
business, and wrote some and read a little at night. Early 
in the following March he set out for a series of wanderings. 
He visited all the Southern States except Virginia, North 
Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia. He took up his 
head-quarters for a short time at New Orleans, and from 
there made excursions into the surrounding country, pass- 
ing through some vast swamps filled with alligators. He 
went to Texas and traveled over 1,000 miles in that State. 
Then he crossed into Mexico, and back to Texas again. 
He then went to New Mexico, and from there to Aiizona — 
that dread region of the dead universe. In New Mexico 
he came near getting mixed up in the Indian war. General 
Crook was then there, and Mr. Maxwell was on the point of 
starting to Silver City, but did not. The company with 
whom he would have gone was set upon by the Indians and 
destroyed. He went to Arizona and stopped a very short 
time at Tucson, and a little longer at Yuma. From Yuma 
it was only across the river to California, and he soon had 
crossed and had set his feet on the Golden Shore. That 
waste solitude looked to him little like a paradise. The 
morning he crossed the mercury stood 130 degrees in the 
shade. He passed into the Colorado Desert, one of the 
hottest countries of the earth. It extends north-westward 
from the Gulf of California. He visited that great wonder 
of the Pacific Slope, the "Boiling Gulf," of California, and 
wrote a splendid description of it for the. columns of The 
Wheellny LitelUgencer, from which we make the following 
extract : 
Half smotheretl as we were, we climbed from the ears to the 



524 HISTOPtY OF TUCKEE COUNTY. 

ground, and started on foot to the Boiling Gulf, which was only a 
few minutes' walk distant. The crust of salt and coarse gravel 
over wl]ich we Avalked was so hot that it burned the soles of our 
shoes. This may sound unreasonable, but it is a fact. But that 
■was no detriment, and in a few minutes we were standing on the 
brink of a formidable pit some ninety feet in circumference and ten 
or twelve feet deep. This was the Boiling Gulf. It was nearly full 
of black mud, which was blubbering and boiling and hissing, like 
that bottomless pit of fire and brimstone which we read of in 
Dante, where the tormented spirits come up from the fierces depths 
below to cool themselves. I said that the pit is ten or tAvelve feet 
deep. I might as well say it is ten hundred feet deep, for nobody 
knows its depth. The mud fills it to within ten feet of the top, and 
what the depth of the mud is cannot be told. There is an intensely 
nauseating odoi* coming up from the foul den. It savors strongly 
of sulphurretted hydrogen, and one turns dizzy to breathe it. 

Some of us climbed down the bank and tested the temperature of 
the foaming mud, and to our surprise v.'e found it cold. The boiling 
is not on account of the escape of caloric, but is due to the escape 
of gasses from the lower regions. This is in reality a volcano, 
alttfough a small one. What kind of an arrangement is connected 
with it under the ground, of course we can only guess ; but it may 
not be too wild a conjecture to predict a modern Vesuvius or ^Etna 
there at some unexpected hovir. 

The surroundings were equally wierd and fantastic. The mirage 
was most wonderfully distinct. Lakes and rivers could be seen in 
every horizontal direction. Rivers seemed to flow among groves of 
the most luxuriant trees and lakes outspread in calmness and 
beauty. 

Mr. Maxwell next stopped at Los Augcles. From there 
he traveled north, passed through the Mojave Desert over 
Tahachapa Pass into the basin of Lake Tulare. He then 
stopped at Fresno City and made that vicinity his head- 
quarters for some months, but he was seldom there more 
than a day or two at a time. 

It was now getting late in the spring. He went td the 



APPENDIX. o25 

mountains in company with liis brother, Cyrus H. Maxwell, 
to spend a few months. They took up their head-quarters 
on the upper waters of the San Joaquin River, about 5,000 
feet above the sea. From there they made excursions into 
the surrounding canons, wildernesses and mountains. One 
of these excursions was to the Nihilvideo Abyss. Mr. Max- 
well wrote up the excursion for the Eastern ]:)ress, and from 
his vivid description of the awful sublimity of the rocks, 
crags and shadows of this abj'smal wonder, we extract the 
following : 

We were by this time drawing near to Xihilvideo ; everything 
indicated that it was not far off. We had rounded a curve in the 
canon of Stephenson Creek, and the canon tlience ran straight 
about a half a mile, when we could see that there was a precipice, 
because everytliing seemed to end there in abrupt nothing*. We 
l^ressed forward over rocks, logs, brush or whatever was in our 
jjath. We were growing enthusiastic. Each was ambitious to be 
foremost. Our hands were cut on the rocks and bleeding, our faces 
were scratched by thorns and our clothes were rent like Rip Van 
Winkle's. It was now noon, on the 23th of Mux, and our eight 
miles were at an end. 

Nihilvideo ! What an impression the first sight made upon the 
minds of my companions, I knew not: I scarcely knew what passed 
through my own iiiind. Ten seconds were as momentous as ten 
years among ordinary things. Never before had such a train of 
swift visions passed before me. Never before had I beheld such a 
manifestation of awful sublimity, the infinite and the eternal, and 
never before had the frailty of man and the immensity of creation 
burst upon me as it did then. Like tlie Austrian geologist, who 
stood upon the crest of the Himalaya Mountains and watched the 
morning sunshine light up the glaciers of the " Everlasting Valley," 
I could only stand mute and let my thoughts and imaginations 
whirl whither as ever they would. No language could paint that 
l^anorama. I was looking down into an abyss thousands of feet 
deep whose ragged sides yawned asunder, hungry to swallow the 
world. I instinctively shrunk Ijack. One moment everything was 
clear, rocks, crags, shadows, depths, all was visible. The next, the 



526 HISTOllY OF TUCKEll COUNTY. 

brain gvtw dizzy, cv^-rytbinj? was spiimiufjr around, nothing was 
seen but the whirl of fading objects, and the juist of dehided vision 
which enshrouded everything. 

It surpassed anything of the kind I had ever seen. I was once in 
the midst of a thunder-storm on one of the higliest peaks of the 
Appahichian Mountains. The hghtning in vivid flashes filled the 
air, and in (juivering tints played on the rocks and pinnacles. The 
dense clouds hiil everything else. 1 thought that this was the 
grandest display of nature possible; but this Nihilvideo surpasses 
it— in all that raises the thoughts to a sense of the sublimity of 
inorganic things. 

Gradually the overwheluietl feelings recovered somewhat, and I 
stepped forward to take a more practical view of what lay before 
me. About a mile distant, and fully 8,000 feet below me, I saw the 
San Joaquin Ri\er, lilce a narrow band of white running along its 
gorge between perpendicular banks thousands of feet high. 
Stephenson Creek had originally plunged over the bank directly 
into the river ; but the Avear of ages had cut away the rock half a 
mile back from the river's edge, thus forming the deep abyss which 
it was our mission to explore. Along each side of this gorge is a 
wall of rock, rising nearly perpendicular, and very rough in its 
formation. This canon extends from the foot of the falls to the 
river, a distance of— say a nn'le, although it may be much farther. 
It varies in width from two hundred to one thousand feet, in differ- 
ent parts. Then, in substance, Nihilvideo is a pit 0,000 feet long, 
500 feet wide, and from 1,000 to o.OOO feet dcn^p. These (calculations 
are not founded ujion any measurement at all, except the depth, 
which I tried to estimate by the velocity of falling bodies, the ve- 
locity of sound, and such other crude data as I had. Mr. Stephen- 
son calculated that the pit, from the foot of the falls to the river, 
Avas 10,000 feet long ; but I r/nc^s-cd it to be about 0,000. 

After a hasty survey of it in general, we began to look for a way 
to get down into the abyss. Standing as we were on the brink, we 
could not see the waterfall alter it i)assed over the verge of the 
precipice. But Ave could hear a confusion of sounds and eclioes 
coming up out of the depths. The bottom was almost constantly 
hidden in fog and vai)or, especially near the foot of the falls, and, 
at interAals, dense columns of mist rolled upward through the 
opening, like the smoke of a volcjino. 



APPENDIX. 527 

We hail (roiiie, not ojily to look into th^^ gull', but go into it. 
We lijul expecteil to be able to climb down the .side, through 
cracks and rifts and thus reach the bottom. But now, with 
the undertaking fidl in view, Ave began to weaken on the en- 
terjirise. It was plainly an impossibility, unless we would 
t!)row ourselves headlong down. Tlie perpendicular walls of rock 
offered no means of descent. Thei-e were a few jutting crags, but 
these Avould be perilous footings, and one misstep would land us 
into luiknoAvn Avorlds. We crept cautiously along the brink of the 
overhanging cliff, to the eastwartl, and one hundred yards from 
the point where the water goes over. We amused ourselves rolling 
rocks over the edge, and hearing them strike the bottom. The 
time required in falling from our hands till we heartl them strike 
the first time was ten seconds. This, allowing one second for the 
sound to reach us, was l,29G feet, or thereabout. But when they 
struck they were not at the bottom. They went boiniding from 
one clifl" to another hundreds of feet further. 

We found a l)oulder, weighing fully four thousand pounds, on 
the very brink of the cliff, tottering on its frail support. By a 
united effort, Ave pushed it off. For many seconds all was silent. 
AVe held ourbi-eath and listened for it to strike. We could not see 
it, but we knew it Avas still falling, and seconds seemed miinites. 
At length, fi jarring crash and thousands of rei)eating echoes an- 
nounced that it struck terra tirma. The eclioes from the sides 
rolled back and forth, dying aAvny in rythmic undulations, almost 
as regvdar as the Aibrating chords of a nnisical instrument. 

" The owlets started from their dreams, 

The eagles answered AVith their screams. " 
And all was still, saA'e the never-tiring fall and dash ()t' the cata- 
ra<;t. Passing on some fifty yards fin-ther to the east we disco\'ered 
H i-ough abutment of rock standing out from the main Avail in bas 
relief — like a chimiiey built up from the bottom of the cliff against 
its side. It extended more than one hundred feet from the verge 
of the precipice and Ave Avalked out upon it, thinking it possible 
that Ave might climb doAvn its une\^en side and thus reach the bot- 
tom. When I reached its outer edge, I found the chimney-like 
structure composed of huge rocks, one upon another. All Avere 
overgrown Avith Aunes and shrubs. I found little difficulty in climb- 
ing doAvn ]aore than one hundred feet, and I belieA^e that I could 



528 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

have gone further if my courage had not failed. But T looked be- 
low and saw the shelving rock on which I stood overhung the gulf 
beneath, and should the rock give way, I would be precipitated 
into the dark, yawning chasm, fully lifteeen hundred feet deep 
fi'om where I stood. With a shudder I looked up. The toji of the 
cliff was overhanging me. Then the thought of how I was to re- 
turn flashed upon me. The shelving rocks that had furnished me 
footing coming doAvii, now seemed a solid wall whose beetling 
brow impended oyer me, with no crag or jutting stone to furnish 
me a footing in climbing back. 1 knew from my feelings that I was 
excited, and I sat down where I was and closed my eyes. 

When the confusion passed away, I looked around me. The first 
cataract of the fall Avas in full view. So was the second, and part 
of the thii'd, but further than that I could not trace the course of 
the watei". Its channel was hidden by passing under the base of 
the column on which I sat. The creek was swollen by the melting 
snow, and poured a volume of water equal to a small river. The 
first fall was about 800 feet high. A body of water fell in nine sec- 
onds. Allowing one-third for resistance of the air, tliis indicated 
a distance of 804 feet. B ut there were other falls innnediately be- 
low the first. The water after passing over the first cataract struck 
a rock, and from it bounded down a second precipice probably 500 
feet high, sti-uck another rock and passed over a third cliff, the 
height of which I could not tell, since it was hidden by the column 
on which I was sitting. . 

* iK * * * * * 

I began my ascent of the clilT. It was a zigzag path. 1 climbed 
fi-om shelf to shelf, never turning my eyes downward, for I knew 
too well what was below. I foimd it almost impossible to get 
back, and I promised myself if I got out of that scrape I would be 
slow in getting into another of the same kind. AVhen I at last 
stood upon the suumiit again. I looked down iiito Nihilvideo, fully 
resigned to let others reap the honors of its exploration. I was 
satisfied. It looks as though one might get into it by following up 
or down the San Joaquin ; but I never expect to do it. I have 
seen Nihilvideo for the last time, so far as I know or care. 

After liis visit to Nihilvideo, Mr. Maxwell visited other 
places of ]nt(M-est anions the wonders of the mountains. 



APPENDIX. 529 

When lie left the mountains he went to the plains and 
worked a month in the harvest field. By this time it was 
late in July, and the weather was very hot. He and his 
brother, and a young Kentuckian, procured a span of horses 
and a spring wagon and set out for a thousand miles of 
travel over the coast counties of California. They first 
visited Lake Tulare, the largest lake west of the Mississippi, 
the Great Salt Lake excepted. This lake is rapidly drying 
up while the water of the Great Salt Lake is rising. After 
spending a day studying the peculiarities of this wonderful 
lake, they turned Avestward across the desert, — one of the 
•most desolate portions of America — got lost, and wandered 
for twenty-four hours without finding water. The hills were 
bare and gloomy. The night was lit by the weird light of 
the moon and the landscape looked like a desolate and neg- 
lected resting-place for the dead, where only sand-storms 
and hot winds moaned mournfully their requiems. But 
Maxwell and his two companions pushed on. At 2 o'clock 
in the morning they reached Avernal Pass, where they got 
water. The next day they reached the mouth of Cholame 
Biver, and camped, with little to eat and no feed for their 
horses. The next day they reached San Luis Obispo and 
and staid there a few days, visited the beach, and, for the 
first time looked upon the placid waters of the Pacific. It 
is a wild, rugged coast about Avalda, and Maxwell and his 
brother — the Kentuckian not going — climbed the clifi's, 
where probably no white man ever went before, and had a 
splendid view of the ocean and the sea birds. 

From San Luis Obispo they went south to Santa Bar- 
bara, whence they went oif to the sea in a boat ; got 
wrecked on the Santa Barbara Islands, and came near star- 

34 



1 



630 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

ving.* After their return from the islands to Santa Barbara, 
they went to Lorn Poc, a community where " prohibition 
prohibits." From Lom Poc they went to Monterey, where 
they spent a few days ; thence north to the mouth of the 
Pajaro River, up that stream to San Juan, and over the 
Coast Mountains to the San Joaquin Valley. They then 
started to cross one hundred miles of desert to Fresno City. 
Their horses gave out and they were left in charge of the 
K^ntuckian. Maxwell and his brother now proceeded afoot 
and reached civilization after they had traveled two nights 
and a day. During this time they had drunk a quart of 
water, which they carried with them in a canteen, and eaten* 
a few raw potatoes and two biscuits. Their feet were so 
chafed and burnt by the hot sands that it was weeks before 
they recovered. 

The remainder of Mr. Maxwell's stay in California was 
chiefly devoted to a revision of the " Conquest." He spent 
the winter there, and in the spring visited Sacramento, San 
Francisco, some of the old mining country, and Humboldt 
Lake, in Nevada. He then turned eastward, across the 
Rocky Mountains, home, which he reached late in April, 
1884, after an absence of more than thirteen months. 

Since his return to West Virginia he has been engaged in 
editing the Tucl-.er County Pioneer, in the publication of his 
" History of Tucker County," and other literar}' work. 

Ho has written much, both in prose and verse, and his 
v/ritings arc always chaste and pure and of a high literary 
order. In this sketch we have no space for extracts from 
any of his poems, and but little for any of his writings for 
the press describing the many exciting scenes witnessed 

• For a fuller account of this voyage, see sketch of C. n. Maxwell, In "Brief Biogra^ 

Ffcf^B," beginning- on page 159 of this book. 



AXPENDIX. 531 

during his extensive travel. We deem extensive extracts in 
this case unnecessary, for the subject of this sketch, as a 
writer, is known beyond the bounds of the circulation of a 
single co^^nty history, and will soon be known more widely 
than now, though we doubt if more favorably known. 

Mr. Maxwell is a model of physical manhood and an in- 
defatigable worker. He drinks nothing but water and ia 
master of his temper. It is impossible to excite him so as 
to make him lose his presence of mind. He never forgets 
a friend. 

Politically, Mr. Maxwell is a Democrat. He believes 
that the South had right on their side in the Civil War. 
But he does not tolerate a belief in the institution of 
slavery. He hates it with a lasting and inappeasable 
hatred. He believes that the white man is superior to 
every other race of the earth. 

He believes that a man merits honor only for what he 
accomplishes — not for what he attempts to accomplish. 
He might try to build a world ; but he should have no 
praise for trying unless he succeeds. 

Mr. Maxwell is an advocate of the doctrine of Carlyle» 
concerning social order and organization. He is with 
Emerson and Herbert Spencer. In science he is a fol- 
lower of Proctor, Tyndall, Huxley and Darwin. He believes 
that the Scriptures are inspired, and that the human soul 
is immortal. His belief in the immortality of the soul is as 
firm and unshaken as the rocks. Ho believes nothing, wiU 
hear nothing, and hate everything, that conflicts with this 
one prime corner-stone of all his beliefs and creeds — that 
which brings the pleasing, dreadful thought of eternity to 
man. 



] 



POLITICAL STAIISTICS. 
After the formation of Tucker County, in 1856, the 
oflBcers which up to this time had been elected by Ean- 
dolph, including Tucker, were elected by Tucker alone. 
The first election was held May 22, 1856, with the following 
resiilts : 

VOTE AT THE FIRST ELECTION. 

* District Ho. 1. — County officers : For clerk of the cir- 
cuit court, Arnold Bonnitield received 12 votes ; William 
Ewin, 3i votes. For clerk of the county court, Arnold 
Bonnifield, 13 votes; William Ewin, 33 votes.t For sheriff, 
Jesse Parsons received 18 votes, William Corrick 7, and S. 
W. Bowman 22. For commonwealth's attorney, Samuel P. 
Wheeler, 31 votes, Rufus Maxwell 8 and John N. Hughes 7- 
For commissioner of the revenue, Daniel C. Adams, 41 
votes, Thomas Bright 5 and Job Parsons, Jr., 1. For sur- 
veyor of lands, Jacob W. See, 34 votes, David Wheeler 8, 
and Solomon Bonner, 4. District Officers : Adam H. Bow- 
man, James W. Miller, John Jones and Jacob Dumire were 
elected justices of the peace. James C. A. Goff, Adam 
Dumire and William Lipscomb were candidates for con- 
stable. Goff was elected by two majority over Lipscomb 
and four over Dumire. Goff received 17 votes. Daniel K. 
Dumire was elected l)y 7 majority over A. Loughry as over- 
seer of the poor. 

XDistrict No. 2. — The election was held at Enoch Mi- 

• Almost identical with the present (18S4) Licking Dlslrtct. 

t John Goff voted for Bounlfleld for county clerk and Ewin for circuit clerk. 

t Almost Identical In territory with the present (18S4) districts of St. George and Clo- 
ver, except part of Clover District which was taken from Barbour County and annexed 
to Tucker, by act of the Legislature of W. Va., passed February 7, 1871. 



APPENDIX. 533 

near's Stone House.* For clerk of the circuit court Bonni- 
field and Ewin each received 44 votes ; but, for clerk of the 
county court Bonnifield received 45 and Ewin 42.t For 
sheriif, Jesse Parsons received 49 votes, William Corrick 24 
and Samuel W. Bowman 14. For commonwealth's attor- 
ney, Eufus Maxwell received 41 votes, John N. Hughes 26 
and Samuel P. Wheeler 21. For commissioner of revenue, 
Daniel C. Adams received 43 votes, Job Parsons, Jr., 33 and 
Thomas Bright 12, For surveyor of lands, Solomon Bonner 
received 44 votes, Jacob W. See 25 and David Wheeler 20. 
District Officers : There were four justices of the peace to 
be elected. There were nine candidates, and they received 
votes as follows : John Kaler 52, Isrcel Phillips 43, F. D. 
Talbott 43, John Yoakam 38, Samuel Kudolph 36, James W. 
Parsons 30, W. R. Parsons 30, David Bonnifield 32, James 
Long 11. Kalar, Phillips, Talbott and Yoakara were elected. 
For constable, Alfred Phillips received 43 votes and N. M. 
Wilmoth 41. For overseer of the poor, Jonathan M. Par- 
sons received 49 votes and Washington A. Long 36. 

District No. 3. — The election was held at the house of 
Andrew Fansler.:!; County Officers : For clerk of the circuit 
court, Arnold Bonnifield received 55 votes and William 
Ewin 2. For clerk of the county court it was the same. 
For sherifi*, Jesse Parsons received 25 votes, William Cor- 
rick 34, and S. W. Bowman none. For commonwealth's 
attorney, John N. Hughes received 28 votes, Rufus Maxwell 
27 and Samuel P. Wheeler 2. For commissioner of the 
revenue. Job Parsons, Jr., received 32 votes, Thomas Bright 

■*Thl3 house stands near the present CourHiouse, and Is the old Mlnear Homestead 
t Samuel Mlnear voted for Bonnifield for county clerk and for Ewin for circuit clerk. 

F. D. Talbott voted for Ewlu for circuit clerk and did not vote for any one for county 

clerk. 
t Near the confluence of Black Fork and Dry Fork. 



634 HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

23 and Daniel C. Adams 1. For surveyor of lands, Solomon 
Bonner received 48 votes, David Wheeler 7 and Jacob W. 
See 1. District Officers : Four Justices of the peace were 
elected. There were six candidates, who received votes as 
follows : Jacob Kalar, 44 ; Jacob H. Long 51, Ebenezer 
Flanagan 47, Enos Carr 31, John R. Goff 26, W. R. Parsons 
17. Kalar, Long, Flanagan and Carr were elected. For 
constable, Garrett J. Long received 29 votes, Robert Flana- 
gan 19 and John Bright 8. Abraham Parsons was elected 
overseer of the poor by 14 majority over John Wolford. 

RECAPITULATION. 

By a recapitulation it is seen that Ai'nold Bonnifield was 
elected clerk of the circuit court by 31 majority and of the 
county court by 36 majority. Jesse Parsons was elected 
sheriff by 27 majority. Rufus Maxwell was elected com- 
monwealth's attorney by 15 majority. Daniel C. Adams 
was elected commissioner of revenue (assessor) by 19 ma- 
jority. Solomon Bonner was elected surveyor of lands by 
36 majority. 

Sl'ECIAL ELECTION, AUGUST 23, 1856. 

A special election was held on August 23, 1856, to elect a 
sheriff t© hold office until the first day of January, 1857, it 
having been decided that the sheriff elected in May could 
not hold office until January 1.* Jesse Parsons (the sheriff 
elected in May) was chosen at this election without material 
opposition. At the Presidential election held in November 
of this year, the Buchanan electors received, in the county, 
137 votes each, and the Filmore electors received 16 votes 
each. Buchanan's majority was 121 votes. There was no 
other ticket voted in the county, and no state, county or 
district officers were chosen at this eleclion. 



* Tucker County was organized In July, 185G. 



APPENDIX. 535 

ELECTION OF 1857. 

An election was held in Tucker County ou May 28, 1857, 
for an attorney general of Virginia, for a commissioner of 
the board of public works of Virginia, for a member of con- 
gress, for a state senator and for a member of the House of 
Delegates of the Legislature of Virginia. In Tucker Coun- 
ty ftt this election, John Randolph Tucker received 114 
votes for attorney general. No other candidate was voted 
for. Z. Kidwell received 117 votes for commissioner of the 
board of public works. There was no other candidate. 
For congress, Albert G. Jenkins received 94 votes, and John 
S. Carlile 21. For senator, John Brannon received 116 
votes. There was no opposition. For house of delegates, 
Samuel Crane received 82 votes, Jacob Conrad 18, William 
Hamilton 17, and Henry C. Moore none. At that time, and 
ever since, in both states. Tucker and Ptandolph together 
composed a delegate district, and the race between Crane 
and Conrad in the district was very close , but Crane got 
the certificate of election, and Conrad contested his seat, 
and after a protracted struggle in the house of delegates, 
succeeded in ousting him. But Conrad ^id not venture to 
be a candidate at the next election.* 

A special election was held, December 14, 1857, in Dis- 
trict No. 2, for overseer of the poor, in place of Jonathan 
M. Parsons, at which election David Wheeler received 8 
votes and Samuel Kalar 7. 

SPECIAL ELECTION, 1858. 

A special election was held on the first day of January, 
1858, in District No. 1, to fill a vacancy in the office of over- 
seer of the poor, occasioned by the retirement of D. K. Du- 

* Crane, Conrad, Hamilton and Moore were all citizens of Randolph County, but 
Moore lived wittiln wliat Is now Webster County. 



536 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

mire. At this election Aaron J. Lougbry was elected, hav- 
ing received 8 votes. Bazil Moats received 1 vote. 

GENERAL ELECTION, 1858. 

A general election was held on May 27, 1858, for the pur- 
pose of electing a lieutenant-governor for the State of Vir- 
ginia, a clerk for the circuit covirt, a clerk for the county 
court, a sheriff, commissioner of the revenue and surveyor 
of lands. A constable was to be elected for each district. 

In the county William L. Jackson,* a candidate for lieu- 
tenant-governor, received 126 votes.t He had no opposi- 
tion. For clerk of the circuit court, Arnold Bonnifield re- 
ceived 54 votes and William Ewin 71. ij: For clerk of the 
county court, Bonnifield received 73 votes and Ewin 70. For 
sheriff, Jesse Parsons received 103 votes and William Corrick 
16. Daniel C. Adams was elected without opposition to the 
office of commissioner of the revenue. For surveyor of 
lands, David Wheeler§ received 86 votes and Nelson Par- 
sons 46. Solomon Bonev. who was not a candidate, re- 
ceived 8 votes. 

In District No. 1, James C. A. Goff' was elected constable 
withoiTt opposition. In District No. 2, S. D. Kalar was 
elected constable without opposition. In District No. 3, 
John Bright was elected constable. 

A special election was held in District No, 1, November 11, 
1858,11 to fill a vacancy in the office of justice of the peace, 
occasioned by the resignation of John Jones. At this elec- 



• William L. Jackson has since tecome known by the name of "Mudwall Jackson," 

t There was no poll opened for him in Ury Fork Precinct. 

t In Dry Fork Precinct no poll was opened for clerk of tlie circuit court. 

{In Black Fork District David Wheeler lost votes from a false rei)ort that ho was not 
a candidate. 

I At the resldemc of A. U, Bovnnan. 



APPENDIX. 537 

tion George M. Nester was elected without opposition, re- 
ceiving ten votes. 

SPECUL ELECTION, 1859, IN DISTRICT NO. 1. 

A special election was held March 12, 1859, in District 
No. 1,* to till the vacancy in the office of justice of the 
peace, occasioned bj the resignation of John Jones, at 
which election Aaron J. Loughry received 8 votes and Geo. 
M. Nester 6.t 

ELECTION OF 1859. 

An election was held in Tucker County, May 26, 1859, 
for the purpose of electing a governor, lieutenant-governor, 
attorney general, congressman, and a member of the State 
legislature. The following table shows the result :X 



* TMs election was held at the residence of A. H. Bowman. 

tAn election had been held on ihe 11th day of November, 1858, to All this vacancy, 
and why It became necessary to hold a second election cannot be learned from the 
records, but such was the case. 

t The poll books and returns for congress and the legislature for the first district 
are missing. 



638 HISTORY OF TUGKER COUNTY. 



^ oS 



OFFICES AND CANDIDATES. ifcSw^l § o 

GOVERNOR. 13^11^ E I 

John Letcher, 27 95 32 22 176 

W. L. Goggin, 3 9 2 3 17 

lilKUTENANT-GOVBRNOR. 

R. L. Montague, 26 92 30 7 155 

W. T. Willey, 4 11 4 16 35 

ATTORNEY GENERAL. 

J. R. Tucker, 27 96 32 24 179 

Walter Preston 3 8 2 1 14 

CONGRESS. 

A. G. Jenkins, 96 32 24 

J. M. Laidley, 7 2 1 

LEGISLATURE. 

Wm. Ewin, 84 7 

S. Crane, 19 27 24 

Wm. Hamilton, 2 

John Taylor, 

H.C.Moore, 

For the legislature, William Ewin received a majority of 
all the votes east in Tucker County, but Randolph County 
gave a sufficient majority to Crane to elect him. 

ELECTION OP I860. 

A general election was held in Tucker County, on Thurs- 
day, May 24, 1860, for the purpose of electing a judge of the 
21st circuit, and the following county and district officers : 
Prosecuting attorney, sheriff, assessor ; four justices of the 
peace, one constable and one overseer of the poor. The 
following table shows the county vote by districts : 



APPENDIX. 



539 



OFFICES AND CANDIDATES. 



JUDQE. 

G. D. Camden . 
Wm. G. Brown . 

PBOSECCTINS ATTORNEY. 

Rnlus Maxwell 
Thomas B. Kmnmel 

SHE BIFF. 

Abraham Parsons . 
William CoiTlck 
Samuel W. Bowman 

ASSiBS^K. 

Daniel c. Adams 

Job Parsons, Jr. . . , 

John White, Sr. . 



a < 



6 g 



a o 



47 

14 

32 
31 

31 
10 
21 

32 

23 

6 





M 




m 


Oou 


M 


1 




g 
^ 

a 








H 


Q< 


^ 


S2 


17 


20 


1 


10 


8 


22 


30 


8 


2 




^ 


18 




2 


3 




20 


4 







8 


12 


21 


2 


23 


1 


13 


1 






145 

38 



102 
83 



86 
55 
43 



•Poll books missing. 



t Abraham Parsons was elected. 



In District No. 1, the vote stood as follows : For justice, 
James W. Miller received 38 votes, G. M. Nester 35, A. H. 
Bowman 32, J. C. A. GoiOf 32 and Jacob Dumire 29. Miller, 
Nester, Bowman and Goff were elected. For constable, 
Andrew D. Moore received 21 votes, Joshua Kobinson 16, 
and Johnson Goff 14. Moore was elected. John D. Nester 
was elected overseer of the poor. The other candidates 
were J. W. Dumire, A. J. Loughrj and John J. Cline. 

In District No. 2 the vote stood as follows : For justice, 
Stephen Domire 60, George B. See 52, Israel Phillips 29, 
WiUiam Pv. Parsons 33, Andrew Pifer 32, Moses Phillips 32, 
John Auvil 22, John Kalar 31, F. D. Talbott 29, S. D. Kalar 
18. Stephen Domire, George B. See, William Pt. Parsons 
and Andrew Pifer were elected. Aaron Phillips was elected 
constable without material opposition. D. K. Dumire was 
elected overseer of the poor. The other candidates were 
J. P. Fitzwaters and Andrew B. Parsons. Dumire's major- 
ity over Parsons was four, and over Fitz ;vaters, seven. 

The election in District No. 3 was as follows : For justice, 
Enos Carr received 57 votes: N. J. Lambert 55, J. H. Long 



540 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

33, Jacob Kalar 27, Jacob TV. Parsons 34, and James Moore 
33. Carr, Lambert and Parsons were elected. Moore and 
Long tied, and it cannot be determined from the records 
whicli got the oj05ce. John Bright was elected constable 
without opposition, and in the same manner Adam H. Long 
was elected overseer of the poor. 

At the Presidential election held this year, in Tucker 
County, the Breckenridge electors received 99 votes each. 
The Douglass electors each received 23 votes, and the Bell 
electors 22. 

ELECTION OF 1.'61. 

From 1856 to 1861, the election returns of Tucker County 
are meagre and out of place ; but from 1861 to 1865, they 
are still more so. The war was then going on, and our pub- 
lic records were subject first to the pillage of one side and 
then of the other. Some of such as can now be gotten to- 
gether are given in the following pages. 

ELECTION FOR DELEGATES TO CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION, FEB., 1861. 

In January or February, 1861, an election was held for 
the election of a member of the Virginia Convention that 
passed the ordinance of secession ; at which election John 
N. Hughes and Samuel Crane were candidates, llughes 
was chosen delegate to the convention, for the district com- 
posed of Randolph and Tucker. But, there is on file in the 
clerk's ofl&ce at St. George no account of such an election. 

ELECTION FOR MEMBERS LEGISIATURE, ETC., MAY, 1S61. 

An election was held in Tucker County, in May, 1861* 
for the election of a member of the Senate and of the Leg- 
islature, and for and against an amendment to the Consti- 
tution of Virginia, and for and against the ordinance of 
secession, with the following results : 

* The day of the month la uncertain. 



APPENDIX. 541 



AMENDMENT TO CONSTITUTION. 



3 •^ SI 



For 00 74 22 17 00 113 

Against 00 2 9 00 11 

SENATE 

John Brannon...*. 19 61 9 18 7 114 

B. Jackson 2 18 12 9 11 52 

LEGISLATURE. 

J.N.Hughes 19 58 9 16 6 108 

Sam. Crane 2 15 12 10 12 51 

ORDINANCE OF SECESSION. 

For 6 ? 

Against 10 ?* 

* Brannon and Hugbes were elected In their respective districts. Tlie votes for and 
against tlie const Itnilonal amendment tias not been found in the clerk's oOice at St. 
George, further than above reported. The vote for and against the ordinance of se- 
cession is missing for every precinct, except Dry Fork ; but, it is well known that the 
county gave a majority tn favor of secession. 

ELECTION UNDER REORGANIZED GOVERNMENT, JUNE 29, 186L 

An election was held under military guard of the United 
States forces, at the residence of Adam H. Bowman, Dis- 
trict No. 1, for the purpose of electing a delegate to repre- 
sent Tucker and Randolph in the legislature of the Beor- 
ganized Government of Virginia (usually called the Wheeling 
Governqaent). The election was held on June 29, 1861.* 
At this election some fifteen or twenty votes were cast for 
Solomon Parsons, of Tucker County. There was no other 
poll opened in any other precinct in the two counties, and 
no return was made from this. But Parsons was duly 
elected according to the laws and exigencies of war times.t 

• The exact date of this election is arrived at by consulting the family records of 
the McC'hesney family. They have it recorded that " Robert McChesney was bom 
June 30, 18^2, and died June 29, 1S61," and since he was killed here, the election musti 
have been on that day. There exist only the merest records of this election, and 
nothing official. 

t This has come to be the most noted election ever held in Tucker County, It was 
there that ilcChesney was killed, and Paxton and Dock Long were slightly wounded, 
and twenty voters elected an officer for two counties, and no official return was ever 
made of the matter. 



542 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

ELECTION FOR COUNTY AND DISTRICT OFFICERS, DEC. 14, 1861. 

Under the Wheeling authorities an election was held in 
Tucker County, December 14, 1861. Polls were opened at 
only two places in the county — St. George and at A. H. 
Bowman's. The election was for a clerk for both circuit 
and county courts, prosecuting attorney, sheriif and county 
surveyor. Justices and constables for each district were to 
be elected. The following table will show the result. It is 
one of our county curiosities, and is, therefore, given in full. 



NAMES OP 


§ . 


3 

o 




Q'O 




f4 


a c 


s 






^ 


VOTERS AT 


" , a 


O 

t?03 


a 


<l i 






Hid 


is 


1 


a> 


i t 


A. H. bow- 
man's, DIS- 
TRICT NO. 1. 


Clerk Circul 
D. C. Adam 

N. C. Grahi 


sa 

6fi 


o 

J^5 


Prosecuting 
M. B. Butte 

A. H. Bowm 


1 


03 


■mO 
OS 

sa 

3 O 




3 

1 


O 


Constables. 
George w. j 

Isac 8. Jam 


D.Wonderly.. 


..1 







1 


1 










1 


1 


1 


Jno. Neville. . 


.1 







1 


1 







1 


1 





1 


J.B.Eobinson<'.l 







1 


1 










1 


1 


1 


M. Bohon 


..0 1 




1 


1 





1 







1 


1 


1 


Robert Jones . 


..1 







1 





1 




1 


1 





1 


G. W. Adams. 


..1 







1 





1 




1 


1 





1 


Jacob Dumire. 


..0 1 




1 


1 









1 





1 


1 


I. S. James. .. 


..1 







1 









1 


1 





1 


W.T.White.. 


..1 







1 












1 


1 


1 


J.W. Miller.. 


..1 







1 









1 


1 





1 


Jos. Neville*.. 


..1 







1 












111 


111 


Jacob Pifer . . . 


..1 







1 












1 




1 1 


Jno. White, Sr. 


..1 







1 

















1 1 


Enoch Minear. 


..1 







1 












1 




1 1 


John Dumire . . 


..1 







1 












1 




1 1 


John P. Gray. 


..1 







1 





















S. E. Parsons. 


..1 







1 












1 




1 


D. K. Dumire. 


. .1 







1 













1 




1 1 


S. H. Parsons. 


..1 







1 





















A. C.Scott.... 


..1 







1 






















Wash. Corrick. 


..1 







1 
























19 2 


19 


1 2 


20 2 


19 3 


17 


8 


8 


8 






'Joseph Neville, and those named following nitn, are those who voted at St. George, 
District No. 2. 

tJohn White and D. Wheeler were the candidates for Justice at St. George, and the 
votes received by them are designated in this column. 

tW. Thompson and S. E. I'ursons were the candidates for constable at St George. 



APPENDIX. 



54J 



So stood the vote of Tucker County, December 14, 1861. 

BLECTION ON RATIFICATION OP FIRST CONSTITUTION OF WEST VIRGINIA. 

On April 3, 1861, an election was held in all the precincts 
of Tucker County, except that of Dry Fork, to vote upon 
the ratification or rejection of the constitution of the pro- 
posed new state of West Virginia. It was also to elect 
justices, an overseer of the poor, and a constable for certain 
districts of the county. The following table shows the 
result : 



CONSTITUTION. 



Dlst No. 1. Dist No. 3. Dl3t. No. 3. TotaL 



For 13 

Against 00 

FREE STATE. 

For 12 

Against 00 

JUSTICES. 

Jacob W. Parsons 

William R. Parsons 

Jacob Flanagan 

Jacob Kalar 

Frederick Dumire 

J. M. L. Porter 

CONSTABLE. 

I. S. James 4 

N.C.Graham 7 



21* 
00 

20 
00 



2t 







OVERSEER OP POOR. 

William Marsh 

H. A. Linsey 

Adam White 



44 
00! 

32 
00 

6 

7' 

1 

6 

7' 

J 

4 
7 



2 
5 

n 



* The votes in mis column were cast at St. George. t Vote at Horse Slioe Run. 

t Members of Company F, 6tli Va. regiment, voters of Preston County, voted at St. 
George, casting 25 votes for tlie constitution and none against it, and 23 votes for Free 
State, and none against it. 

ELECTION OF MAY 23, 1862. 

On May 22, 1862, an election was held in Districts Nos. 1 
and 2 of Tucker County, for the purpose of electing a gov- 
ernor, lieutenant-governor and attorney general of the re- 
organized state of Virginia (West Virginia). The election 



544 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

was also for the purpose of electing a clerk for the circuit 
and county courts, sheriff, assessor, surveyor of lands, and 
for constables and overseers of the poor. The following 
table shows the result : 

ELECTION HELD IN DISTRICTS NO. 1 ^ND 2, MAY 22, 1862. 

District No. 2 
District Court- Hoi-se To- 

GOVKRNOR. No. 1 House ShceRun tal 

F. H. Pierpont 23 44 15 82 

LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR. 

D. Polslev 22 44 16 82 

John A. Dille 00 00 00 00 

ATTORNEY GENERAL. 

James S. Wheat 22 43 15 80 

CLERK OF COUNTY AND CIRCUIT COURTS. 

D. S. Minear 4 19 4 27 

A. H. Bowman 20 19 5 44 

John White, Jr 00 1 00 1 

J. M. L. Porter 2 00 11 13 

Isaac Painter 3 3 

SHERIFF. 

A. D. Moore 22 44 19 85 

ASSESSOR. 

William W. Parsons 13 3L 3 47 

D. C. Adams 7 4 2 13 

D. L. Dumire 4 6 15 25 

W. W. Hansford 2 3 00 5 

SURVEYOR. 

Solomon Bonner 24 . 36 15 75 

H. Wilson 00 5 3 8 

In District No. 1, I, S. James was elected constable over 
N. C. Graham. 20 votes were cast for constable. In Dis- 
trict No. 2, Adam Dumire was elected constable, having no 
Disposition. Of 26 votes, Joseph Neville received 14 major- 
ity over Van Buren Goff, for overseer of the poor. 

On June 28, 1862, a special election vas held at the 
Court-House in St. George for the purpose of electing a 
justice "to fill the vacancy of David Wheeler, resigned," 
and for electing a constable for District No. 2. The poll 
and the names of the voters are given rather more as a 
curiosity than anything else. 



APPENDIX. 545 

} li 

Justice Constable 

NaniP of Aiuevs. A. C. Scott A. Duniire U. PliUllps 

'Tolni Dumire 1 1 

Enocli Miueav. . . . ;■ 1 i 

]). S. Minear 1 1 

Adam .Dnmire I 

David Wlieekn- 1 1 

KLEO'l'ION OF MARCH 26, 1868. 

All clcctioi) was lield in Tucker Couiit3^ on March 2G, 
18G3, to take tlie vote for and against the amended consti- 
tution of tlie jn-oposod State of West Yirginia." Polls were 
opened at Hannahsville (A. H. Bowman's), St. George and 
H<^i'se Shoe Piun, and the vote was as follows: 

y. St. George Horse Shoe Run Hannalisville Total 

For Amcndmont 27 3 15 45 

Against '• 00 1 1 

(iENERAL ELECTION, iMAY 28, 1868. 

On May 28, 1863, an election was held in Tucker County, 
and polls were opened at St. George, Hannahsville, and at 
Pine Grove Church, on Horse Shoe Run. The following 
officers were to l3e voted for : governor, secretary of state, 
treasurer, auditor, attornej'^ general, and three judges for 
the court of appeals, for the State of AVest Vieginia.I- 
There were also to he elected a judge for the circuit court, 
senators, members of the legislature (at Wheeling), clerk of 
the circuit court, sheriif, prosecuting attorney, surveyor of 
lands, and recorder. The following talile shows the result 
of the vote as it was taken : 



* There is a tag attached to these poll books, urging the officers of election to make 
prompt returns. At this time the admission of West Virginia as a State in the Union, 
was kept back for want of the Amendment to the Constitution. 

t This Is the first mention on the official records of Tucker County of the State of 
West Virginia. This was May 38. On June 20, It was admitted into the Union. It 
^^-as at first proposed to name it " New Virginia." 



546 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 



OFFICES AND CANDIDATES. S ^ I 

I I ^ -^ 

3 o « 2 

QOVKRNOR. W 3d S H 

Arthur I. Boreman, 16 17 4 37 

SECRKTARY OP STATK. 

J. E. Boyer, 16 17 4 37 

TREASURER. 

Campbell Tarr, 16 17 4 37 

AUDITOR. 

Samuel Crane 17 16 4 37 

ATTORNEY GENERAL. 

A. B. Caldwell, 16 17 4 37 

COURT OF APPEALS. 

R. L. Berkshire, 16 17 4 37 

Wm. H. Harrison, 16 17 4 37 

James H. Brown, 16 17 4 37 

CIRCUIT JUDGE. 

John A. Dille, 15 15 4 34 

SENATOR. 

D. S. Minear,* 10 1 

LEGISLATURE. 

Charles Burke, 14 16 30 

Drummond.t 2 2 

Cyrus Kittle 1 1 4 6 

CLERK CIRCUIT COURT. 

A. H. Bowman 16 16 4 36 

SHERIFF. 

Jacob Dumire 16 16 32 

A. D. Moore 1 12 4 

PROSECUTING ATTORNEY. 

M. B. Biitterlield, 17 8 1 26 

J. C. A. Brown, 8 3 11 

SURVEYOR OF LANDS. 

William Thompson, 17 17 3 37 

J. M. L. Porter, 11 

RECORDER. 

Adam Tait, 16 16 

AdamH. Bowman, 16 1 4 21 

* D. S. Mlnear was not a candidate. 

t The fli-st name of DruDimond cannot be deciphered from the books. Ills surname 
18 all that Is known In 'J^ucker, and that only inasmuch as It Is on the books. 

ELECTION OF OCTOBER S2, 1863. 

The first election held in Tucker County after tlie for- 
mation of West Virginia, was October 22, 1863. Polls were 



APPENDIX. 547 

opened at Hannahsville, St. George and Black Fork 
(Abraham Parsons'). Following is the result : 

1st District 2nd District 3rd District 
SENATOR. HannahavlUe St. George Abraham Parsons' 

D. D. Farnsworth, 9 24 

Fred Berlin, . . 7 

CONGRESS. 

W. G. Brown, 9 25 2 

W. B. Zinn, .. 5 

LEGISIiATUKE. 

Cyrus Kittle,... 8 9 1 

Charles Burke, 1 15 6 

ASSESSOR. 

W. W. Parsons, 10 19 6 

Adam Tait, 1 1 

SHERIFF. 

Jacob W. Parsons, 11 2 

BLECTION OF JANUARY 23, 1864. 

In an election held in Tucker County, January 23, 1864, 
S. E. Parsons was elected County Treasurer. 

In Hannahsville Township the vote stood as follows for 
district officers : 

For supervisor, AV. T. White received 8 votes, Jacob Du- 
mire 7 and D. C. Adams 7. For justice, James W. Miller 
received 21 votes. For constable, John W. Dumire re- 
ceived 20 votes. For township clerk, T. C. Adams received 
22 votes. For township treasurer, J. P. Gray received 19 
votes. For inspector of elections, John O. Robinson and 
John Neville each received 20 votes. For overseer of the 
poor, William Jones received 20 votes and Jehu Lipscomb 2. 

St. George Township Officers* — For supervisor, Andrew 
Pifer received 29 votes and John White 11. For justice of 
the peace, D. S. Minear received 14 votes, I. Phillips 25, 
John Kalar 1. For township clerk, Adam Tait received 42 
votes. For county treasurer, D. K. Dumire received 35 
votes. For overseer of the poor, Adam Dumire received 3 

• A poll was opened at tbe Court-house only. 



548 HISTOllY OF TUCKEE COUNTY. 

votes and Hobert Phillips 85. For inspector of election, H. 
Linsey received 3 votes and S. Dnmiro 32. For constable. 
Solomon Kalar received 3G votes. For sheriff, H. Moore 
received 27 votes. 

UANNAUSVILLE TOWNSIlir EL15CT10N, FEBKUAKY 15, 1861. 

At an election held in Hannahsville Township, February 
13, 1864, S, E. Parsons received 22 votes for county treas- 
urer. Votes for the other offices were as follows : For 
supervisor, D. C. Adams 11, Jacob Dumire 11. For justice 
of the peace, J. W. Miller 20. For township treasurer, 
John P. Gray 21. For townshiji clerk, Thomas C. Adams 21. 
For constable, J. W. Dumire, Johnson Goff 5. For over- 
seer of the poor, William Jones 18. For inspector of elec- 
tion, John Neville 19, John ilobinson IG, Amassa Goff 2, 
William Burns 1. 

BLACK FOIiK TOWNSHIl' KLECTION, FEBRUAJtY 20, 18G1. 

At an election held at Andrew Fansler's, for Black Fork 
township, February 20, 18G4, the vote stood as follows : 
county treasurer, S. E. Parsons 23. Supervisor, W. W. 
Hansford 17, Jacob H. Long 5. Treasurer, Abraham Par- 
sons, John G. 0. Parsons and A. H. Long received one vote 
each. Township clerk, Job Parsons 11, C. Parsons G, G. J. 
Long G. Justice of the peace, William Corrick 12, Jacob 
H. Long 11. Constable, Harrison Moore, 10. Overseer of 
poor, Adam H. Long 17, Edward Thornhill 2, Ward Par- 
sons 2, J. H. Long and Andrew Fansler 1 each. 

ST. GEORGE TOWNSHIl' ELECTION, Al'KIL 28, IS04. 

At the township election held at St. George, April 28, 
1864, the vote stood as follows: justice, Adam Tait, 16; 
constable, Lloyd Pife)*, 16; township treasiirei", 1). S. 
Minear, 13; overseer of the ])oor, A. H. Linsey, 15; town- 
sln]> clerk, S. E. Parsons, 2. 



APPENDIX. 549 



OFFICJ':S AND CANDIDATES. 



GOVERNOR. K 

Arthur I. Boreman, 13 

ATTORNEY GENERAL. 

E. E. Hall, 13 

SECRETARY OF STATE. 

G. D. Hall, 13 

AUDITOR. 

J.M.McWliorter, 13 

TREASURKIt. 

Campbell Tarr, 13 

CONGRESS. 

Moses Titohenell, 12 

George R. Latham, 2 

Smith, 2 

William Zinii 9 

SENATE. 

Kolison, 13 

Corley, 

LEGISLATURll 

Wilmoth, 

Cvrus Kittle, 4 

Charles Burke, 10 

Phares, 

PROSECUTING AI'TORNEY. 

Spencer Dayton, 8 

Charles Hooton, 5 

Moses B. Butterlield, 1 

Brown, 

G. Cresap, 

COUNTY TREASURER. 

S. E. Parsons, 15 

RECORnER. 

A. H. Bowman, (» 

John J. Adams, 8 

_ SURVEYOR OF LANDS. 

Cornelius Parsons, 

Joseph Parsons, 

William Thompson, 14 

ASSESSOR. 

D. C. Adams, 14 

William li. Parsons, 1 



38 


43 


94 


38 


43 


94 


38 


43 


94 


38 


43 


94 


38 


43 


94 


8 





20 


9 


25 


36 





2 


4 


7 


9 


25 


5 


# 


21 


10 




13 


5 


4 


9 


3 


18 


25 


29 


22 


61 


1 


1 


2 


3 


22 


33 





2 


7 








1* 


31 


2 


33 





17 


17 


38 


33 


86 


10 


IG 


32 


34 


21 


63 


2() 


IG 


42 


4 


10 


14 





1 


15 


2f') 


2 


42 


19 


25 


45 



* Ou the margin of the election returns some one wrote, just after Butterflelcl's name : 
Wliere was Moses wlicn the light went out ?" 



550 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION, NOVEMBER 8, 1864. 

At an election held in Tucker County, November 8, 1864, 
the Lincoln and Johnson electors received votes as follows : 
Hannahsville 7, St. George 31, Black Fork 18, total in the 
county 56. The McClellan electors received at Hannahs- 
ville 14 votes, at St. George 12, at Black Fork 10. Total in 
the county 92, of which Lincoln had 20 majority. 

TOWNSHIP ELECTIONS, APRIL 27, 1865. 

At township elections held on April 27, 1865, the follow- 
ing officers were elected : 

Hannahsville Townshij). — Supervisor, D. C. Adams ; treas- 
urer, John P. Gray ; clerk, Thomas C. Adams ; overseer of 
roads, Joseph B. Robinson ; overseer of the poor, Joseph B. 
RobinsoBI^'overseer of roads, 2nd district, George W. Adams; 
inspector of elections, John J. Cline ; school commissioner, 
Jacob Dumire ; constable, Thomas C. Adams. 

St. George Township. — Supervisor and treasurer, Andrew 
Pifer; clerk, John J. Adams; constable, Solomon Kalar; 
overseer of the poor, John Jones ; overseer of roads, Robert 
Phillips; inspector of elections, Stephen Dumire; school 
commissioner, Stephen Dumire. 

Black Fork Tovmshi^). — Supervisor, W. W. Hansford ; 
treasurer, W. W. Parsons ; clerk, C Parsons ; constable, A. 
L. Corrick; overseer of the poor, John Bright; overseer of 
roads, Jacob W. Parsons and A. H. Long ; inspector of 
elections, I. A. Gilmore ; school commissioner, Thomas 
Bright. 

ELECTION OF OCTOBER 20, 1865. 

Oil October 26, 1865, an election was held in all the 
townships of Tucker. The war was then over, and it was 
the first election in time of peace for a long time ; but, even 
then, so manv of the voters were disfranchised on account 



APPENDIX. 551 

of their sympathy with the South, that the vote shows no 
considerable part of the voters. It stood thus : 

OFFICES AND CANDIDATES. 

SENATE. Hannahsvllle St. George Black Fork Total 

E. J. O'Brien, : 18 21 11 50 

Joseph Teter, 15 7 8 30 

J. H.Woodford, I 7 8 

Charles Burke, 1 2 5 8 

LEGISLATURE. 

Rufus Maxwell, 19 25 11 55 

David Wheeler, 18 13 15 46 

PROSECUTING ATTORNEY. 

Charles Hooton, 21 7 14 42 

G. Cresap, 13 1 13 27 

Samuel Woods, 1 20 . . 21 

SURVEYOR. 

Solomon Bonner, 30 13 22 65 

Joseph Parsons, ; 4 16 3 23 

ELECTION OP MAY 24, 1866.* 

On May 24, 1866, an election was held in Tucker County, 
and the vote stood thus : 

CANDIDATES. 
CO. SUPT. OF SCHOOLS. HannaUBville St George Black Fork Total. 

A. H.Bowman, 22 51 35 108 

Cornelius Parsons, 20 22 16 58 

Jacob Dumire, . 4 4 

Abraham Parsons, 7 7 

For ratification constitution 19 13- 9 41 

Against " " 29 61 51 141 

A. H. Bowman's majority was 50. The ratification of the 
amendment to the constitution was defeated by 100 major- 
ity. There is no record of a poll having been opened on 
Horse Shoe Run or Dry Fork. The election of Black Fork 
Township was held at the residence of John R. Goff. 

* ^fter 1865 only the election of county, state and national officers will be given in 
full*. It would require too mucli space even to mention tne officei-s and candidates tor 
the district offices. 



552 HISTORY OF TUCI^E COUNTY. 

GENERAL llLECTION, OCTOBER 25. 1866. 

On October 25, 1866, a general election, for state and 

county officers, was held in Tucker County, with results 
seen in the following table : 

OFFICES AND CANDIDATES. 

GOVEKNOR. UannalisviUe St. George Black Fork Total 

Arthur I. Boreman, 24 14 10 48 

Benjamin H. Smith, 35 62 41 138 

SECRETARY OF STATE. 

John S. Witcher, 24 14 10 48 

John W. Kennedy, 35 62 41 138 

AUDITOR. 

J. N. McAVhorter, 24 14 10 48 

Peter Darnell, 35 62 41 138 

IliEASUEER. 

J. H. Biistor, 24 14 10 48 

J. S. Burdett, 35 62 41 138 

ATTORNEY GENERAL. 

Thayer Melvin, 24 14 10 48 

Nathaniel Richardson, 35 62 41 138 

JUDGES SUPREME COURT. 

Edwin Maxwell, 3 14 10 27 

R.L.Berkshire, 56 62 41 159 

CONGRESS. 

B. M. Kitchen, 17 14 10 41 

E. W. Andrews, 35 62 41 138 

SENATOR, 6th DISTRICT. 

Nathan H. Taft, 31 33 40 104 

James C. McGrew, 6 6 

AVilliam B. Zinn, 1 1 

D. D. Earnsworth, 1 10 11 

LEGISLATURE. 

Charles W. Burk 35 55 40 130 

James Drummond, 20 13 10 43 

CLERK OF THE CIRCUIT COURT. 

A. H. Bowman, 23 29 31 83 

John J. Adams, 29 46 19 94 

SHERIFF. 

Ward Parsons, 4 19 18 41 

D. K. Dumire, 17 9 26 

Andrew Pifer, 8 14 9 31 

Israel Phillips, 30 33 25 88 



APPENDIX. 553 

{Continued.) 

OFFICES AND CANDIDATES. 

COUNTY RECORDER. HaimalisvlUe St. George Black Fork Total 

A. H. Bowman, 23 28 30 81 

John J. Adams, 29 46 19 94 

COUNTY TREASURER. 

S. E. Parsons, 1 12 10 23 

Arnold Bonnifield, 40 oQ 39 135 

Andrew Pifer, 1 1 

A. H. Bowman, 1 1 

PROSECUTING ATTORNEY. 

Charles Hooton, 15 7 10 27 

G. Cresap, 30 48 33 111 

J. H. Carroll, 12 16 9 37 

SURVEYOR OF LANDS. 

Joseph Parsons, 47 65 41 153 

William Ewin, 1 1 

A. Bonnifield, 1 1 

ASSESSOR. 

A. H. Long, 4 18 22 

John White, 35 49 25 109 

D. C. Adams, 20 7 6 33 

D. L. Dumire, 6 14 5 25 

JUDGE CIRCUIT COURT. 

John A. Dille, 5 5 

TOWNSHIP ELECTIONS, MAY 23, 1S07. 

On May 23, 1867, township elections were held in Tucker 
County, with results set forth in the following table : 

Hannahsville. St. George. Black Fork. 

Man elected. Ma j. Man elected. Maj. Man elected. Maj. 

FOR SUPERVISOR. 

T. F. Hebb, 4 John Jones, 9 Job Parsons, Jr., 30 

JUSTICE. 

J.W.Miller, .. S.E. Parsons, 23 M. Wolford, 1 

CONSTABLE. 

W. J. Sage, 4 Wm. Shaw, 11 John H. Long, 27 

OVERSEER OF THE POOR. 

Wm. Jones, 40 Wm. Shaw, 20 Jacob Fansler, 21 

CLERK OF THE TOWNSHIP. 

J. W. Dumire, 6 J. J. Adams, 12 Solomon Bonner, 33 

TOWNSHIP TREASURER. 

J.P.Gray, 1 D.K. Dumire, 10 Thomas Bright, 1 

INSPECTOR OF ELECTIONS. 

J. J. Cline, 10 D. K. Dumire, 11 Ward Parsons, 3 

30 



)54 



HISTOKY OF TUCKEK COUNTY. 



HannahsvlUe. 
Man elected. 



J. J. Cline, 



Maj. 

21 



[Contimied .) 

St. George. 

Man elected. 



Maj. 



Black Fork. 
Man elected. 



M.C.Atberton, 14 
Geo. G. Adams, 1 
E. Hovatter, 14 



SCHOOL COMMISSIONER. 

Eobt.Phillips,10 W. D. Goft: 

ROAD SURVEYOR. 

D.K.Dmnire,13 
Robt.Pliillips,19 
G.M.Parsoiis,20 



S. R. Fansler, 
Thomas Bright, 
Solomon Bonner, 
E. Flanagan, 



Maj. 

13 

1 
1 
1 
3 



ELECTION OF OCTOBEK 24, 1S67. 

An election was held in Tucker County, October 24, 1867, 
and the result runneth thus : 

OFFICES AND CxYNDIDATES. 

SENATE. HannalisvUle St. George Black Fork* Total 

E.J. O'Brien, 22 16 13 51 

W. J. Drummond, 19 9 8 36 

LEGISLATURE. 

F. M. White, 22 17 12 51 

J. W. Dunnington, 19 8 36 

SUPT. OF SCHOOLS. 

Joseph Parsons, IS 17 11 46 

A. H. Bowman, 7 4 11 22 

COUNTY TREASURER. 

Andrew Pifer, 1 4 5 

Jacob Dumire, 18 2 20 

* The Black Fork election waa held at the residence of Ward Parsons. 
GENERAL ELECTION, OCTOBER 22, 1SII3. 

There was an election held for both State and county of- 
fices, October 22, 1868. The following is a summary of this 
State election, as it stood in Tucker County :i- 

t The official returns from St. Georg-e are not Included in this table. They would 
probably increa.se the majoiitles of the Democratic candidates to 8S each. Tucker 
county was now becoming decidedly nemocratii;. During the M-ar, and shortly after 
the disfranchisement of somany voters, on account of supposed sympathy with the 
South, had allowed the Republlcu))s to gain the rule. But, as soon as these war dis- 
qualifications were done away with, the i)emocrats returned to power stronger than 
ever. The tyranny of their opponents served to strengthen what it was meant to 
weaken, a.s it always docs and always will do. 







APPENDIX. 




555 


OFFICES AND 






OFFICES AND 






CANDIDATES. 






CANDIDATES, 






GOVERNOR. 


Vote. 


Majority. 


ATTORNEY GENERAL. 


Vote. 


Majority 


J. N. Camden,. . . 


79 


48 


W. T. Willey,... 


79 


48 


W. E. Stevenson 


31 




Thaver Melvin, . 


31 




SECRETARY. 






SUPREME JUDGE. 






S. V. Yantis,.... 


79 


48 


M. Edmiston, . . . 


79 


48 


J. M. Pifes, 


31 




K L. Berkshire,. 


31 




AUDITOR. 






CONGRESS. 






Daniel Mayer, . . 


79 


48 


W. G. Brown, . . . 


79 


48 


Tlios. BofTgess, . . 


31 




Jas. C. McGrew, . 


31 




TREASURER. 






SENATE. 






Geo. I. Walker, . 


79 


48 


D. S. Peterson,. . 


80 


50 


J. M. Macanley, . 


31 




D.D.T.FarnsworthSO 





It is a little remarkable that only one ticket was scratched 
at this election, that of D. D. T. Farnsworth, of Upshur 
County, in fayor of David S. Peterson, of Lewis County. 

ELECTION OF OCTOBER 22, 18(j«. 

At the county election held in Tucker County, October 22, 
1868, the result stood thus : ♦ 

OFFICES -\ND CANDIDATES, 5 £0 o c: ^ 



LEGISLATUEE. ^ 

John A. Hooton, 33 

William Bennett, 7 

RECORDEI!. 

John J, Adams, 44 

PROSECUTING ATTORNEY. 

G. Cresap, 33 

Charles Hooton, 14 

COUNTY SURVEYOR. 

Joseph Parsons, 35 

ASSESSOR. 

8. E. Fansler, 22 

Jacob Dumire, 11 

Abraham Parsons, 9 

JUDGE CIRCUIT COURT. 

John J, Brown, 32 

John A. Dille, 16 



64 
24 

70 

64 
22 

67 



37 

r: 



35 

7 



9 
4 



143 
40 



39 14 167 



10 142 

5 48 



39 12 153 



29 


28 


15 


94 


28 


3 





42 


29 


8 





46 


63 


6 


9 


110 


23 


8 


6 


53 



55G HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

On the same day an election for Hannalisville Township 
resulted as follows : 

For township clerk, John R. Loughry received 35 votes, 
John W. Dumire, 4. Overseer of the poor, John J. Cline 
received 23 votes, William Jones 17, John D. Nester 1, El- 
ton Hovatter 1, John Shaffer 1. Township treasurer, James 
C. A. Goft' 37, James W. Miller 1. Inspector of election, 
Johnson Goff 1, John J. Cline 10, T. B. Lipscomb 4, Joshua 
Robinson 2. Road surveyor, 1st precinct, H. T. Loughry 
27, W. H. Lipscomb 30; 2nd precinct, George Hovatter 19. 

ST. GEORGE TOWNSHIP ELECTION, OCTOBER 22, 1808. 

The township election at St. George, on October 22, 1868, 
resulted as follows : 

Supervisor, Rufus Maxwell 58, John Jones 29. Town- 
ship clerk, Jdlin J. Adams 69, no opposition. Overseer of 
the poor, Andrew B. Parsons 65, no opposition. Treasurer, 
S. E. Parsons 69, no opposition. Inspector of election, D. 
K. Dumire, 36, Elihu Phillips 28. Road surveyor, 1st pre- 
cinct, William Ewin 63, no opposition. 2nd precinct, Thos. 
M. Mason, 50, Price Montgomery 17. 3rd precinct, John 
W. Godwin 62, no opposition. 4tli precinct, James P. Fitz- 
waters 62, no opposition. School commissioner, Stephen 
Dumire 63, no opposition. Constable, Andrew L. Du- 
mire 5, no opposition. 

BLACK FORK TOWNSHIP ELECTION, OCTOBER 22, 18(38. 

The election in Black Fork Township on Octol)er 22, 
1868, stood as follows : 



APPENDIX. 557 

OFFICES AND CANDIDATES. 

SUPEEVISOR. Ward Parson's, Flanagans'. Total, Majority. 

Job Parsons, Jr., 34 4 38 23 

W. W. Hansford, 7 8 15 

S. K. Pansier, 3 3 

TOWNSHIP CLERK. 

Solomon Bonner, 13 14 27 

A. B. Parsons, 27 27 

Adonijali B. Parsons,^-.. 

OVERSEER OF THE POOR. 

John Bright, 8 1) 17 

Abraham Parsons, 32 32 15 

TOWNSHIP TREASURER. 

Thomas Bright, 13 1) 22 

J. H. Long, 1 1 

Ward Parsons, 37 5 42 20 

INSPECTOR OF ELECTIONS. t 

Ward Parsons, 29 . . 29 

J. I. Propst, 34 . . 34 5 

INSPECTOR OF ELECTIONS. [J! 

James B. Carr, . . 3 3 

Gabriel Bains, .. 6 6 3 

SURVEYOR OF ROADS, 

S. E. Pansier, W. I. Pansier and Ward Parsons, in Black 
Fork and, Alfred Flanagan, Solomon Bonner and George 
Fansler in Dry Fork, were elected. 

* Tills Is the first mention In the election returns of Tucker County of the name of 
Adonljah B. Parsons, 
t Black Fork. t Dry Fork. 

PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION, NOVEMBER i), 1868. 

At the Presidential election! ^e,\d in Tucker County, No- 



§ As a specimen of the tyranny and proscription existing as long after the close of 
the war as 18(j8, we give the oath that was required to be taken by the officers. It was 
not enough to have vanquished a brave enemy, but when he was powerless, the flres 
of persecution were kindled wltli more fury than ever. The following was the oath : 

"State of West Virginia, County of Tucker, ss.: 

I, , Supervisor of Election, at , in said County, do solemnly swear that 

1 will support the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of this State, 
that I have never voluntarily borne arms against the United States, that I have vol- 
untaiHy given no aid or comfort to persons engaged In armed hostility thereto, by 
countenancing, coimsellng or encouraging them In the same, that I have not sought, 
accepted or attempted to exercise the functions of any oflice whatever, under any au- 
thority In hostility to the United States, that I have not yielded a voluntary support 
to any pretended Government Authority, Power or Constitution within the United 
States, hostile or inimical thereto, and that I take this obligation freely, without any 
mental reservation or purpose of evasion. And I further swear, that, in the election 
about to be held, I will faithfully and Impartially discharge my duties to the best of 
my skill and judgment. So help me God." 



558 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

"vember 3, 1868, the Democratic Electors received 130 votes 
and the Republicans 54.* 

ELECTION RETURNS OCTOBER 2S, 186D. 



tl: » p: 

61) 23 


p4 
1 


109 


9 








25 


00 


32 


15 


123 


19 


3 





41 


m 








93 


7 


28 





38 











1 








14 


14 








1 


1 



OFFICES AND CANDIDATES. > 

a 
a 

SENATE. g 

Spencer Dayton, 16 

Blackwell Jackson, 16 

LEGISLATURE. 

Rufus Maxwell, 17 

Joseph W. Davis, 19 

SUPERINTENDENT OF SCHOOLS. 

Riifiis Maxwell, 27 

Joseph Parsons, 3 

Job Parsons, 1 

J. G. Flanagan, 0" 

William Hansford, 

SUPEKYISOR OF ELECTION. 

T. F. Hebb, 20 

John D. Nester, 13 

AV. H, Lipscomb, 1 

M. C. Atherton, 1 

Rnfus Maxwell, 32 

John Jones, 27 

John Anvil, 20 

Job Parsons, 27 

William Rains, 11 

Gabriel Rains, 1 

• William Rains, 15 

INSPECTOR OF ELECTIONS. 

John J. Cline, 23 

T. B. Lipscomb, 5 

D. K. Dumire, 42 

J. P. Fitzwaters, 16 

John I. Propst, 32 

James Parsons, 1 

Gabriel Rains, 10 

James B. Carr, 5 



* Hon. A. W. Campbell, Republlciui elector al larfTP, rooplvod four votes more than 
any other one on that ticket. 



APPENDIX. 559 

{Continued.) 

i • ' ^ 

OFFICES AND CANDIDATES. 1 I" P I « 



rt 



OVERSEER OF THE POOR. a ^ S S^ W 

Jacob Dumire, 17 

Poor old Jones," 1 

D. K. Nester, 1 

Nathan Loughry, 4 

William Jones, 5 

John M. Cross, 66 

D. K. Dumire, 1 

John Bright, 30 

John I. Propst, 1 

John Bright, 4 

SCHOOL COMMISSIONER. 

J. W. Miller, 17 

John J. Cline, 1 

Peter Sanders, 4 

David Lipscomb, 1 

J. C. Golf, 1 

John Jones, 1 

Adam Tait, 29 

John J. Adams, 1 

John Anvil, 31 

William E. Long, 2 

John I. Propst, 28 

Solomon Bonner, 1 

AVilliam E. Fansler, 3 

TOWNSHIP CLERK. 

M. C. Atherton, 17 

John W. Dumire, 10 

John R. Loughry, 8 

D. L. Dumire, 1 

John J. Adams, 72 

A. B. Parsons, 19 

Solomon Bonner, 9 

S. R. Fansler, 9 

Solomon Bonner, 15 

John G. Moore, 1 

TOWNSHIP TREASURER. 

M. C. Atherton, 17 

' This Is the name on the official election returns. 



;60 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

{Continued.) 



OFFICES AND CANDIDATES. 3 ^^ -f ° - 

a Si :a ^ a -i 

* ^ 5 •• "^ o 

W 02 M ? W H 

Elton Havatter, 15 

T. B. Lipscomb, 1 

James Gotf, 1 

Sansom E. Parsons, 75 

Thomas Bright, 30 10 

CONSTABLE. 

Peter Bohon, 1 

Johnson Golf, 13 

J. J. Cline, 5 

W. H. Lipscomb, 2 

Robert Phillips, 36 

Adam Tait, 1 

Moses Phillips, 15 

James P. Fitzwaters, .... 1 

Salathiel Phillips, 1 

Jacob Wolford, 2 

JUSTICE. 

Jesse Parsons, 46 

James P. Fitzwaters, 11* 

* In this election there were two complete poll books and election returns from eacii 
voting place. The test oath was still taken by the election officers. 



OFFICES AND CANDIDATES £? 

o 
a> 
O 

GOVERNOR. g 

John J. Jacob, 80 

W. E. Stevenson, 21 

SECRETARY OF STATE. 

John M. Phelps, 80 

James M. Pipes, 21 

AUDITOR OF STATE. 

E. A. Bennett, 80 

Thomas Boggess, 21 

STATE TREASURER. 

John S. Burdett, 80 

James A. Macauley, 21 



w 

26 

36 


C3 

38 
6 


19 
9 


163 

72 


23 
39 


38 
6 


20 
9 


161 
75 


25 
36 


38 
6 


20 
9 


163 

72 


26 
36 


38 
6 


20 
9 


164 

72 



APPENDIX. 561 

{Continued.) 

OFFICES AND CANDIDATES ^ I g € 

2 rt '^ O 

S c ^ fe ^ 

ATTORNEY GENERAL. ^ B S 6 g 

Joseph Sprig!?, 80 

A. B. Caldwell, 21 

JUDGE SUPREME COURT. 

C. P. T.Moore,. 80 

James li. BroAvn, 21 

CONGRESS. 

O. D. Downey, 80 

James C. McGrew, 21 

STATE SENATE. 

William C. Carper, 79 

D. D. T. Farnswortb, 15 

LEGISLATURE. 

P. C. Barlow, 3 

L. Clienoweth, Gl 

William Pbares, 14 

SHERIFF. 

T. M. Mason, 80 37 39 29 185 

Jacob Dumire, 20 23 4 00 47 

CLERK CIRCUIT COURT. 

Jobii J. Adams,. 94 59 3G 28 217 

RECORDER. 

John J. Adams, 84 

C. L. Bowman, 9 

RROSECUTING ATTORNEY. 

William Ewin, 65 

Charles Hooton, 14 

SURVEYOR OF LANDS. 

Nige Parsons, 63 20 26 (> 117 

ASSESSOR. 

S. K Pansier, 78 

James Parsons, 19 

James Miller, 3 

Levi Hile, 1 

37 



26 


38 


20 


164 


36 


6 


9 


72 


26 


38 


20 


164 


36 


6 


9 


72 


26 


38 


20 


164 


36 


6 


9 


72 


20 


37 


20 


156 


00 





3 


18 


10 


17 


9 


39 


25 


13 


20 


119 


00 


00 


00 


14 



41 


31 


28 


184 


20 





00 


29 


34 


15 


2 


116 


16 


00 





30 



30 


26 


29 


163 


1 


16 


00 


36 


29 


1 





33 











1 



5C2 HISTOKY OF TUCKEB COUNTY. 

At tbis election there were polled votes as follows : Han- 
nalisville, 40 ; St. George, 82 ; Black Fork, 38 ; Dry Fork. 
IG; total, 17G. 

ELECTION OF OCTOBER 26, 1871. 

An election was held in Tucker County, October 20, 1871, 
and the result stood thus : 



OFFICES AND CANDIDATES, 



STATE SENATE. 



P^ 



o 



(^ 



uj n K n t< 
George H. Morrison, 55 26 18 00 99 

Hoy McLean,.. 53 14 33 27 127 

LEGISLATURE. 

John A. Hutton, 90 28 49 00 167 

John Taylor, 26 8 10 35 79 

SUPERINTENDENT OF SCHOOLS. 

Philetus Lipscomb, 61 36 00 00 97 

James Parsons, 16 00 39 00 55 

Joseph Parsons, 9 2 . . 00 11 

The following officers Avere elected in the districts: 
Justice, St. George, AVilliam E. Talbott, 79. Hannahs- 
ville, James W. Miller, 33. Black Fork, Jacob H. Long, 46. 
Constable, St. George, John W. Carrico, 72. Hannahsville, 
John T. White, 18. Black Fork, Daniel Flanagan, 37. 

Whether to subscribe $25,000 to the stock of the Wash- 
ington and Ohio Railroad was voted upon as follows : 

St. George. Hannahsville. Black Fork. T)ry Fork. Toial. 
For Subscription, 19 13 4 30 (>(> 

Against " 82 29 45 13 169 

CONGKESSIONAL ELECTION, OCTOBF.li 24, IH72. 

B. r. Martin. .L Nelson Wlsncr. 1). I). T. Farnswortl^ 

St. George, 33 1 4 

Hannahsville, 9 1 3 

Black Fork, 28 

Drv Fork, 12 1 

Tokl, 82 2 8 

Mnjority 74 



APPENDIX. 563 

In the Presidential election of November 5, 1872, tho 
result stood thus in Tucker County : 

St. George. Hannahsville. Black Fork. ]Jry Fork. Total. jMajoilty 

Democrat, . 47 23 40 11 121 32 

Republican, 35 29 12 13 89 

ELECTION OF OCTOBER 13, 1874. 

On October 13, 1874, an election was ]ield in Tucker 
County, with results as follows : 

CONGRES?. St, George, nanuahsville. Black Fork. Drv Fork. Total. 

Chas. J. Faulkner, 42 19 40 10 111 

A. R. Boteler, 7 5 (5 18 

SENATE. 

David Goff, 42 19 40 5 lOG 

D.D.T.Farnsworth, 00 17 

LEGISLATURE. 

Jacob H. Long, . . 37 21 43 4 105 

J. J. Adams, 7 7 

E. Harper, 1 1 

A. B. Parsons, .... 1 1 

No. of votes cast, . 49 24 415 10 129 

GENER.^iL ELECTION, OCTOBER 11, IdTC. 

The general election on the second Tuesday in October, 
1870, sunniied w]) thus in Tuelsov (^^oniity: 



564 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

OFFICES AND CANDIDATES. 

„^„^^„^^ Votes received 

GOVERNOR. In the county. Majoritr 

Henry M. Matthews, Democrat, 341 208 

Nathan Gotr, Jr., Republican, 133 

ATTORNEY GENERAL. 

Robert White, Democrat, 344 215 

John A. Hutchinson, Republican, 129 

AUDITOR. 

Joseph Miller, Democrat, 343 213 

C. M. Shinn, Republican, 130 

TREASURER. 

Thomas J. West, Democrat, 344 214 

Moses Frankenberger, Republican,.,.. 130 

SUPT. OP SCHOOLS. 

W. Iv. Pendleton, Democrat, 344 

F. H. Crago, Republican, 130 

JUDGES SUPREME COURT, FULL TERM. 

Okey Johnson, Democrat, 343 

A. F. Haymond, " 343 

W. H. H. Flick, Republican, 130 

R. L. Berkshire, " 130 

JUDGE SU. COURT, VACANCY. 

Thomas C. Green, Democrat, 333 

R. 8. Brown, Republican, 140 

SENATE. 

Charles Newlon, Democrat, 347 

George A. Jackson, Republican, 56 

LEGISLATURE. 

E. Hutton, Democrat, 207 220 

L. Chcowith, " 77 

W. E. Taylor, 28 

Total vote in the county, 474 



APPENDIX. 

COUNTY ELECTION, OCTOBER 11, 1876. 

OFFICES AND . : S ^ v ^^ 

CANDIDATES. S" I S- p 

O W cs bo .. f^ 

^ 2 is ^ ^ 

SHERIFF. s* § ia i S 

A. H. Bonnifield, 33 ^47 14 19 4 

Ward Parsons, 23-2 28 32 56 

W. E. Talbott, 45 3 16 4 

PRES. COUNTY COURT. 

Eufus Maxwell, 37 42 9 11 2 

S. E. Parsons, 38 8 26 3 42 

George I. Tucker,.... 6 5 2 1 

Jolm Jones, 7 6 72 6 

James W.Miller, 12 39 3 

A. B. Parsons, 1 

John Snyder, 16 

PROSECUTING ATTORNEY. 

William Ewin 17 1 16 26 3 

W. B. Maxwell, 38 29 29 25 12 

A. B. Parsons, 43 19 40 44 49 

ASSESSOR. 

S. K Pansier, 26 10 26 19 43 

D.B.Hart, 12 1 18 13 

S. N. Swisher, 7 36 5 9 

P. Lipscomb, 48 6 46 25 5 

D. S. Minear, 7 5 6 5 

N. Nester, 12 17 

COUNTY SURVEYOR. • 

J. D. Nester, 64 41 64 69 43 

Joseph Parsons, 14 10 

P. Lipscomb, 6 13 

Solomon Bonner, 1 1 2 

The election for St. George District stood thus : 



565 



18 


1 

135 


45 


186 


2 


70 


4 


105 


10 


127 


12 


26 


1 


92 


1 


55 





1 


39 


55 


5 


68 


2 


135 


59 


254 


57 


181 





44 


1 


58 


9 


139 





23 





29 


45 


326 





24 





19 


1 


5 



566 HISTOKY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

OFFICES AND CANDIDATES. 

■M- -D T- -JUSTICE. St. George. Horse Shoe Run. Majority. 

M. JJohon, 4 Q 

^•v- Miller, ;.".;;; 41 21 20 

Jacob Dumire, U 4 

J. M. Jenkins, ^ q q 

John Fansler, 24 18 

William Anvil, 5 2 

Benson Hebb, 4 q 

CONSTABLE. 

S.T. Purkey, 44 q 28 

W.C. Anvil, 3 

Whannel, jg 

J. S. Swisher, 4 

D. K. Dumire, 2 

L. S. Anvil, 3 

W. B. Lipscomb, 2 

D. H. Spesert, 23 

William Closs, 9 

M. Bohon, 5 



APPENDIX. 567 

ELECTION IN CLOVER DISTRICT. 
OFFICES AND CANDIDATES. 

JUSTICE. Votes received. Majority. 

E. Harper 21 

E. D. Murphy 18 

Moses Phillips 22 1 

J. P. Fitzwater 9 

J. H. Nester H 

W. S. Godwin 12 

CONSTABLE. 

Marion Phillips 49 30 

B. F. Myers 19 

M. Nester 1 

J. Bright 2 

J. Shoemaker 1 

ELECTION IN LICKING DISTRICT. 
JUSTICE. 

J. D. Nester 22 

W. H. Lipscomb 52 30 

J. C. H. Goft- 8 

CONSTABLE. 

John Burns 26 13 

N. H. W. Loughry 13 

Joshua Kobinson 1 

W. F. Statan 3 

S. James 3 

I. S. James 10 

A. D. Goff 1 

ELECTION IN BLACK FORK DISTRICT. 
JUSTICE. 

James E. Parsons 21 

John I. Propst 16 

S. M. Callihan 22 1 

W. W. Hansford 5 

CONSTABLE. 

Lloyd Parsons 35 23 

A. Furguson 12 

The returns show that James B. Lambert was elected 

constable in Dry Fork, and William Rains, justice. 



568 



HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 



GENERAL ELECTION, OCTOBER 12, 1880. 



OFFICES AND CANDIDATES, c: 



GOVERNOE. 

Jacob B. Jackson, . 
George C. Sturgiss, . 
N. B. French, . . . 

AUDITOR. 

Joseph S. Miller, 
J. S. Cunningham, . 

TREASURER. 

Thomas O'Brien, 
Richard Burke, 

ATTORNEY GENERAL. 

C. C. Watts, . . . 
G. B. Caldwell, . . . 

JUDGE COURT OF APPEALS, 

Thomas C. Green, . 
Edwin Maxwell, . 

STATE SUPT. OF SCHOOLS 

B. L. Butcher, . . . 
A. L. Purinton, . 

JUDGE — OLD CIRCUIT. 

John Brannon, . 

JUDGE — NEW CIRCUIT. 

"William T. Ice, . 
James A. Brown, 

SENATE. 

T. J. Farnsworth, 

LEGISLATURE. 

C. J. p. Cresap, . . 
J. W. Price, . 
G. H. Daniel, 
W. W. Price, 
M. Currence, 
M. C. Lawson, 





g 


o 
u 




1 




■a 
1 


75 


4^8 


117 


53 


66 


41 


390 


56 


17 


15 


45 


13 


• 58 


204 


3 


2 


1 


4 


6 


9 


25 


77 


48 


117 


53 


66 


41 




54 


17 


15 


45 


13 


58 




77 


48 


117 


53 


66 


41 




54 


17 


15 


45 


13 


58 




77 


48 


117 


53 


66 


41 




54 


17 


15 


45 


13 


58 




77 


46 


117 


52 


66 


41 




54 


18 


15 


45 


13 


58 




77 


48 


117 


53 


66 


41 




54 


17 


15 


45 


13 


58 





126 59 121 83 70 58 



77 


49 116 


57 


65 


35 


56 


17 15 


41 


14 


63 



77 51 117 67 70 39 



61 


2 


39 


18 


23 


17 


37 


6 


7 


13 


14 


19 


2 


2 


3 


6 








2 

















19 


37 


15 


35 


16 


40 


1 


6 


31 


6 


14 


3 



APPENDIX. 



569 



COUNTY ELECTION, OCTOBER 12, 1880.— {Continued). 



OFFICES AND CANDIDATES. 



a S, 



SHERIFF. 


^ 


o 

a 


o 

3 


O 


n 




g § 


A. C. Minear, . 


82 


46 


68 


46 


27 


89 


358 121 


W. E. Talbott, . . 


51 


20 


20 


85 


48 


13 


237 


Jacob Wolford, . 


1 





6 


4 


9 


2 


22 


PROSECUTING ATTORNEY. 
















P. Lipscomb, 


69 


49 


58 


41 


34 


41 


292 4 


A. B. Parsons, . 


62 


15 


38 


84 


46 


43 


288 


ASSESSOR. 
















Joshua Messenger, . 


9 


6 


12 


4 


20 





51 


J. G. Flanagan, . 


58 


34 


24 


21 


13 


88 


238 139 


J. T. Mason, 


3 


2 


6 


8 








19 


Nathaniel Nester, 


17 


9 


23 


48 


2 





99 


D. S. Minear, . 


29 


13 


14 


25 


6 


1 


88 


H. L. Nester, 


11 


1 


10 


30 


17 


7 


76 


COUNTY COMMISSIONERS. 
















E. Harper, . 


81 


28 


51 


35 


50 


245^ 




T. F. Hebb, . . . 


65 


16 


38 


15 


7 


141 




Leonard Phillips, 


18 


32 


21 


77 


17 


165 




William Kains, . 


113 


52 


36 


19 


54 


274^ 




Jonathan Murphy, . 


32 


7 


31 


51 


14 


135 




Henry Goff, . . . 


13 





23 


32 


1 


69 




S. M. Callihan, . . 


58 


57 


52 


71 


65 


303^ 




John Felton, 


7 





24 


9 


2 


42 




PRES. COUNTY COURT. 
















Jacob H. Long, . 


105 


60 


74 


67 


70 


72 


448 320 


John Jones, . 


25 


6 


21 


51 


11 


14 


128 


COUNTY SURVEYOR. 
















E. W. Cross, . . 


98 


7 


55 


77 


13 


250 


106 


John D. Nester, . 


15 


50 


22 


43 


14 


144 




S. C. Baker, . . . 


17 


8 


2 


8 


50 


85 





Electea. 



570 HISTORY OF TUCKER COUNTY. 

ELECTION IN ST. GEORGE DISTRICT, OCTOBER 11, 1880. 

Justice.— St George : M. V. Miller, 80 ; D. K. Dumire, 45. 
Hannahsville : M. V. Miller, 37 ; D. K. Dumire, 20. Total 
vote : Miller, 117 ; Dumire, 65 ; Miller's majority, 52. 

Constable. — St. George: John Deets, 77; William C. 
Auvil, 41. Hannalisville, John Deets, 50 ; William C. 
Auvil, 9. Total vote, Deets, 127 ; Auvil, 50 ; Deet's major- 
ity, 77. 

ELECTION HELD OCTOBER, 1880, AT BLACK FORK. 

Justice. — J. E. Parsons, 29 ; E. Haddix, 18 ; A. S. Phillips, 
3 ; Adam Pansier, 28 ; S. Phillips, 7 ; L. Walker, 1. Par- 
sons's majority, 1. 

Constahle. — J. Johnson, 12 ; Thomas Long, 1 ; Eugenus 
Johnson, 35 ; Furguson, 12. E. Johnson's majority, 23. 

LICKING DISTRICT, OCTOBER, 1880. 

Justice. — John R. Loughry, 37; J. C. A. Goff, 34; J. 
W. Miller, 26. Loughry 's majority, 3 

Constalle.—Z. J. Cline, 9; D. R. Shafer, 36; W. F. She- 
hon, 9 ; T. S. Jones, 11 ; N. A. W. Loughry, 13 ; J. W. Du- 
mire, 15 ; Henry Hovatter, 1. Shafer's majority, 21. 

CLOVER DISTRICT, OCTOBER, 1880. 

^^^«^^ce.— Moses Phillips, 61; W. S. Godwin, 30; G. T. 
Miller, 34. Phillips's majority, 27. 

Constable.— liK. I. Phillips, 62; B. F. Myers, 39; Robert 
Murphy, 17. Phillips's majority, 23. 

DRY FORK DISTRICT, OCTOBER, 1880. 

Justice. — J. W. Bonner, 53 ; J. H. Lambert, 40. Bon- 
ner's majority, 13. 

Constable. — R. P. Johnson, 29; A. Flanagan, 7; Daniel 
Carr, 27 ; F. H. Collins, 7 ; S. I. Bonner, 22. Johnson's 
majority, 2. 



APPENDIX. 



571 



GENERAL ELECTION, OCTOBER 10, 1882. 



OFFICES AND CANDIDATES. 

CONGKESS. 

W. L. Wilson, . 
J. W. Mason, 

JUDGE SUP. COURT APPEALS. 

Adam C. Snyder, 
F. A. Gutherie, . 

SENATE. 

A. W. Woodford, 
M. W. Cobun, . 

LEGISLATURE. 

A. B. Parsons, . 
S. M. Callihan, . 
Harmon Snyder, 
R. W. Estham, . 
J. M. Jenkins, 

COUNTY COMMISSIONER. 

John Jones, 
r. F. Hebb, 
W. W. Hansford, 
Robert Phillips, . 

COUNTY SURVEYOR. 

xlufus Maxwell, . 
John D. Nester, . 



53 

31 

44 

2 

2 

51 

48 



23 



23 
5 

5 

7 
4 



24 28 
7 



37 

2 



o 2 ►► S " 

^ S 2 o rt 

00 n u >3 S 

79 35 84 45 60 

53 7 11 16 22 



81 35 83 42 62 
51 7 10 18 19 

82 36 84 40 62 
50 6 10 20 20 



75 29 38 

6 00 25 

8 28 13 

4 2 4 
10 

73 2 27 

12 53 2 

2 4 52 

5 12 

68 41 25 

2 9 42 



S- O « 

« H a 
21 324 137 

78 187 

45 
45 



37 
50 

13 221 

4 89 
2 100 

84 96 
00 8 

16 176 

39 158 

29 139 

6 21 



18 



69 328 247 
3 81 



In Dry Fork, R. P. Johnson was elected constable. In 
Licking, Johnson Goff was elected constable, and B. I. Fur- 
guson was elected in Black Fork. 



INDEX. 



This index extends only to page 348 of this book. Thia 
matter following that is either arranged alphabetically or is 
tabular, and is, of itself, an index. 

The figures in the following refer to the pages of the 
book: 



Adams, Daniel C, 116. 
Alum Hill, 155. 
\uv11's Mill Dam, 159. 

.uvirs Shmgle Mill, 164. 

uvll, L. s., 202. 

B. 

Bonnlfleld, Abe, 27. 
Bounltleld, A. T., 212- S92. 
bonnifleld, Samuel, 94. 

:)nnifleld. Dr. Arnold, 9S. 

■"Piilfleld, Henry, 23i). 

jwlng (;ave, 13?. 
B ark Fork, '53-ir)5. 
B! u d, Dr. William, 339. 



Con .ents, Table of, 9-13. 
Civil War, 816. 
Confederate Flag: taken, 317. 
Corrlck's Ford, 33J. 
Clothing, '.2. 
Churches, 76. 
" Canada," 107. 
Cheat River, 150-1.54. 
Closs Mount tin, 136, 
Closses' Shingle Mill, 16'J. 
Coal, 169. 

Cayton, W. M., 196. 
Cameron, Daniel, 55-60. 

D. 

Dedication, 3. 
Dunmore War, 38. 
Davis, 172. 
Dymo^ra', 191. 
Dumire, Kinehart, 102. 
Dumire's Shingle Mill, 164. 
Dry Fork, 153. 



Ewln, Hon. William, 19i 



F. 

Falling Spring, 13X 
Farts, Joseph A.. 315. 
Fort in the Horse shoe, Z&. 



G. 

Garnett, Gen. 319-327. 
Green .Mountain, 136. 
Goff. James, 90. 
Goffe, John, 40-62. 
Guns, 76. 



H. 

Harper, Capt. Ezeklel, 220 to 248, 287, 289, 

318,328, 329, 339. 
Harper, Adam, 119. 
Harper, Thaddeus, 3'^2, 218, 292. 
Harper, Jerome. 231, 236, 248, 232. 
Harper, Jacob, 233 

Harper, William, 318, 323, 328, 333, 340. 
Horse Shoe, 20-158. 
Horse Shoe Kun, 57. 
Horse Shoe Ford, 158. 
Hansford. Lloyd, 201. 
Houses, 71. 
Holbert, Lyda, 8'>. 
Hall, Capt. William, 340. 
Hog Back, 136. 

I. 

Imhoden, John, 340. 
"Island," 1.^7. 
Intoxicating Liquors, 75. 
Indians, 27-59. 
Introduction, 5-S. 
Illustrations, List ol, 15. 






Pii-i- i;j. A, B 



2,93. 



iv^itor'. ^Xincui, r!3"30. 



i3ta'.:'.>m, rho,i 



L -;iiUio it'Olu, lut" 



:!>,. 7». 






Miner Hill, iat>-ibo. 
Murder Hole, 160. 
Moundbullders, 24. 
Mill at St. George, 41. 
Maxwell, Rufus, 199. 
Maxwell, W. B., 202. 



N. 



Neville's Ford, 156. 



Old Andra, 135. 



T. 
Teachers, list of, 185. 
Turtle Rocks, 161. 
Tomahawks, 76. 
Tov, Flnley, 311. 
Talbot t, William, 318, 336. 
Tucker County, 17, 122, 124 

W. 
W. Va. C. & V. Rwy, 167. 
Washburn, .'iii 
Willow Point, 157. 
Wild Cat Point, 157. 



Thk Em). 



